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Shards of unseen, but sharply-felt shattered glass, both of a collapsing marriage and the infamous Kristallnacht(Night of Crystal), are fused together in Arthur Miller’s Broken Glass, now playing at Theater J. It is a satisfying evening with an unyielding, rarely-revived drama because of a fine compelling cast under the strong clear direction of Aaron Posner. The evening will be especially appealing for those interested in a rarely-revived Miller drama that wrestles with dreams for a more enlightened world. It was written well after his masterpieces of theater made him a cultural touchstone, late in his illustrious career. It was first performed in 1994 and was last seen in the DC area about two decades ago.

Broken Glass is set in 1938. Newspaper articles with photos of the aftermath of Kristallnacht have hit New York City. Seeing images of old Jewish men cleaning a Berlin sidewalk with toothbrushes hits Sylvia Gellburg, a married Jewish woman living in Brooklyn, especially hard. Lise Bruneau movingly portrays Sylvia – a woman who exists in a nightmare of a crumbling, dead marriage – with such authority that I easily felt her pain and loneliness as authentic. Her later moments of action and courage in the production appear as realistic.

Marriage and life have taken a toll on Sylvia. But she is by no means blameless, as she has humiliated her husband early in their marriage. Sylvia suffers from a baffling medical condition: she is unable to walk or feel below her waist. Is it some kind of hysteria as she becomes more and more obsessed with what is happening to Jews in Germany? Is there a connection between the two events, thousands of miles apart? Is Sylvia’s physical condition a mental health reaction to her unhappy, stressful marriage?

Her husband, Philip, is a tense, tightly-wound, self-loathing Jewish man. Paul Morella portrays the stressed, anxious man ready to explode at the slightest provocation. He is like a lithium battery about to violently burn, harming himself and others.

Broken Glass takes us on a journey like a medical detective procedural to find answers to what really caused Sylvia’s debilitating condition. Sylvia’s symptoms are discussed, analyzed, and diagnoses suggested. In parallel, conditions of German Jews under the rising Nazi power are also discussed and analyzed; Sylvia is like a Greek Chorus of one, sending out warnings that no one wants to hear.

Those who Miller enlists on the journey for answers includes a “hero” – a family doctor who seems a wonder of decency with an interesting ritual habit of riding a horse down Ocean Parkway in Brooklyn to make it through his day. Oh, and he is also a bit of a womanizer. Played by Gregory Linington, the doctor is a man with a quick smile and somewhat open mind, but plenty of flaws.

The doctor’s insightful, cleared-eye wife is played by Kimberly Gilbert who, in a dandy performance, provides not only a distinct “objective” perspective to the proceedings, but adds amusing comic relief, as well. Also notable are Stephen Patrick Martin, playing Philip’s boss – a banker who has suffered a loss of his own, and Michele Osherow, who portray Sylvia’s solid, decent-to-the-core sister, who serves as a lovely, unclouded voice for a family’s usually-unspoken, deep history and dynamics.Paul Morella and Lise Bruneau in Arthur Miller’s Broken Glass at Theater J. Photo by Teresa Wood.

Broken Glass does feel soft at times as Miller’s script is just so damn direct. But, then as the production nears its final scenes, it picks up energy, power and plenty of flawless, layered work from the principals. The production becomes a maelstrom about facing the worst life can bring upon people. The final fade is not easy to bear witness.

Andrew Cohen’s Broken Glass set is a minimalist one – chairs and tables that serve their purpose. Moving projections are made into over a dozen frames at the rear of the set, showing world events in the late 1930’s. The projections were developed by Mark Costello from rarely-available images from stories in American newspapers. These were made available through a unique collaboration with the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

Tyler Gunther’s costume design was a wealth of period specific clothes. Lighting design by Harold F. Burgess II and Justin Schmitz’s sound design added textures to what could have easily been a visually static production. And applause are due for the scene changes in Broken Glass. They were more than mere brown-outs. Instead, there were projections of cellist Udi Bar-David while his recorded, mournful music connected the scenes.

Miller has his doctor say what he wants the audience to truly hear. Whether it resonates in these current days of identity politics and world tumult is anyone’s guess. “I have all kinds coming into my office, and there’s not one of them who one way or another is not persecuted. Yes. Everybody’s persecuted… sometimes I wonder, maybe that’s what holds this country together! And what’s really amazing is that you can’t find anybody who’s persecuting anyone else.”

Avant Bard’s King Lear is a bracing, piercing production of a family and realm in heightening disarray. The galvanizing production plumbs the depths of an unnamed country in which loyalty reigns, deceit lurks, chaos ensues, and pain drives its sharp lance into hearts and minds. The time could be just before now, or maybe what could be just a few moments into the future.

This Lear has a life force that enraptured me. It was built from the start with Director Tom Prewitt’s sure-handed, distinctively eclectic outlook.

Let’s start with the refreshing, integrated casting of newcomers to the Shakespeare canon and a non-traditional, re-gendering of several characters that added to this KingLear’s allure. Then combine with the authoritative work of Avant Bard company members, and the commanding presence of Rick Foucheux as Lear, himself. Then, further enhance the production with a fired-up design team who enveloped my senses with storms, flash-bang sounds, and lighting effects, along with some well-placed chimes at midnight and noon too.Such a straightforward plot is King Lear. Shakespeare has audiences witness the decline into dementia (or perhaps a late onset of PTSD for a warrior King) of an aging Monarch. He has divided his Kingdom. He has given parts as a bequest to two of his three daughters after testing each with a simple question: How much does each love him?Smooth-talking flattery spews easily from the lips of two daughters, both older and married, Goneril and Regan. The youngest daughter, Cordelia, single and still living at home, speaks more plainly if not honestly, which angers Lear to his very core. He quickly disowns Cordelia and banishes her.

Chaos ensues within both the broken family and kingdom. The married daughters show their true natures, betraying their father with the assistance of an in-it-to-win-it malcontent named Edmund. The ever more unhinged Lear wanders his kingdom (“Who is it that can tell me who I am?”) howling at the moon with a small entourage of loyal followers. These include a long-time confidant named Gloucester (re-gendered to a female character from the original male in Shakespeare), a steadfast Fool (“Many a true word hath been spoken in jest”), and resourceful protectors such as Kent attempting rescues until the play’s chilling denouement with the unexpected valiant swordplay of Edgar (played by a female actor as a male).But those are mere plot points and some dialogue.

What makes this King Lear so majestic an evening are finely calibrated, galvanizing performances starting with Rick Foucheux as Lear. Foucheux is commanding as a man, father, and King. He is lucid but quick-tempered to a fault. (Is this a sign of late onset PTSD from a King in too many battles?) When first we encounter him he seems a King and man to enjoy company with. But his temper is fearful. His need to be loved without quenching. As madness shows itself more and more, Foucheux babbles as if on the brink of a final break with reality. He throws himself about the stage; crawling and shouting, whimpering and shaking as he tries mightily to keep his wits. Foucheux is simply larger than life, and he fills the tight surroundings of Gunston’s Theatre II with a sheer bravura performance—a tour de force. Foucheux made me feel his Lear as I have rarely grasped before.Cam Magee, in the role of Gloucester was a very affecting presence. She and her character add great depth to the relationship with Lear. Magee was impressive and expressive throughout as she withstood trials and tribulations testing her loyalties. Let me add that in one scene toward the end of Act II, when she withstands a special torture, I saw many an audience member turn away from the intensity of the stage horror. With Gloucester a female, there were also unexpected tenderness and wisdom.As Edgar, Sara Barker was a penetrating and absorbing presence in a challenging role of a protector of Lear who has to withstand his old tests of mettle. Charlene V. Smith’s Regan is made of steel with a ‘don’t fuck with me’ bearing. Goneril, as played by Alyssa Sanders, has a verbally vicious, stinging manner toward all that come into her presence. Kathryn Zoerb’s Cordelia is no pushover as a young woman who speaks truth to power with a spine and a sword when it is necessary.

The technical team of Scenic Designer Jonathan Dahm Robertson, Lighting Designer John D. Alexander, and Sound Designer Justin Schmitz establish a striking, forceful atmosphere for the production; a ragged, seen-better-days geodesic dome in some back-channel, godforsaken place where storms rage, thunder bellows, and eerie foreboding chimes strike. The costume design by Elizabeth S. Ennis is a beauty.

There is nothing commonplace about Avant Bard’s King Lear. It is ambitious and illuminating. This production made my heart ache as the production unfolded. It is memorable for many reasons starting with Rick Foucheux’s mind-boggling performance as a man named Lear, on the verge of and then succumbing to a breakdown. Avant Bard’s King Lear is also a deep dive into the wreckage of a family and country undone by false loyalty, and fake genuflection and arrogance.

King Lear has sometimes been called the Everest of classical acting. Every great Shakespearean actor must sooner or later face the physically and emotionally exhausting task of playing the part. Some simply give up. Albert Finney, when asked, is reported to have said; “Oh God, eight shows a week doing Lear – no, no, no.” Derek Jacobi, whose Lear was widely praised, called it the “Lear hoop” which one must jump through. The role of Lear is notoriously hard on actors. Jonathan Pryce put his back out carrying Cordelia. Edward Petherbridge had a stroke after two days of rehearsals. One famous Lear, Donald Wolfit, is said to have given the following advice on the role: “Get a light Cordelia and keep an eye on the Fool.”

Shakespeare scholar Jonathan Bate believes that for a successful Lear you need a minimal set, closeness to the audience, and a Lear who is the right age. In an article in The Telegraph, he continues: “The key to a great production is the ability to hold together the huge and the tiny, the universal and the local, the epic and the intimate. Shakespeare’s language makes just this demand, as it moves at speed from vast philosophical questions (“Is there any cause in nature that makes these hard hearts?”) to the language of small and ordinary things — garden waterpots, gilded flies and toasted cheese… It’s sometimes said that the problem with the part of Lear is that “by the time you are old enough to play it, you are too old to play it.”

Avant Bard’s production of King Lear meets all these preconditions. The set is minimal, and the staging is in the round; a wonderfully intimate venue. Even better, Foucheux is not only the perfect age (60s) but perfect for the part.His Lear is a triumph. One of the glories of the performance is his voice. Voice, voice, voice. What Lear can succeed without it? Foucheux has an instinctive command of voice, from the loudest scream to the softest whisper. His physicality is equally masterful. He inhabits his body like a lion at bay, and rages at the gods like a wounded beast. One of the most memorable scenes is Lear, standing on the central platform, shouting imprecations at the sky, while the storm’s wrath swirls around him.

His relationship with Gloucester (Cam Magee) is a high point of the production. The play is well known for its double plot; Lear rejects Cordelia, the one daughter who truly loves him, in favor of the duplicitous Goneril and Regan. Gloucester believes the lies of her ice-cold illegitimate son, Edmund, and casts off Edgar, the good son who struggles and survives. The harrowing aspects of the drama are intensified by having Gloucester played as a woman. Magee’s magnificent performance enlarges the possibilities of the character and her story. The look she exchanges with Lear in the beginning is deeply knowing. They seem to share a mature love. Magee’s connection to sons Edgar and Edmund introduces the subject of maternal love and suffering. Instead of a play focusing solely on the ultimate father figure, we see the actions of the mother as a key element of the plot. This is a marvelous innovation and a heartening turn of events for those of us who love Shakespeare and lament the paucity of women’s parts.

Magee’s early lines as Gloucester, in the hands of a male actor, would come across as somewhat coarse boasting.

“[T]hough this knave came something saucily into theworld before he was sent for, yet was his motherfair; there was good sport at his making, and thewhoreson must be acknowledged.”--King Lear, Act I, Scene 1.

In Magee’s hands, Gloucester is a player, a confident, powerful woman who acknowledges her son’s illegitimacy as blandly as she would his rejection by the college of his choice.Lear begins as an arrogant despot. His lack of self-knowledge makes him easy prey for the manipulations of Goneril (Alyssa Sanders) and Regan (Charlene V. Smith). Sanders plays Goneril, the dominant sister, as a mix of aggression and underlying sensuality. As Regan, Charlene V. Smith has a magnetic presence and an innate ferocity. The two sisters’ deceitfulness seems inborn, but there is no doubt that greed and intense jealousy of Cordelia (Kathryn Zoerb) play a role in their machinations.

Lear’s overwhelming need for Cordelia’s love seems to provoke her refusal to flatter him. Foucheux and Zoerb establish a strong bond which causes excruciating pain when it is broken. They seem alike, as well—resolute and stubborn. Their reconciliation mirrors their emotional growth. Lear, who has lost everything, has gained his humanity. Cordelia has rediscovered her love for her father, and her ability to comfort him.

Christopher Henley’s Fool is full of sound, fury, and impudent wisdom. Henley creates a complex Fool who is not afraid to challenge his master. “Dost thou call me fool, boy?” Lear asks. “All thy other titles thou hast given away,” the Fool replies. “That thou wast born with.”Dylan Morrison Myers’ Edmund is constantly on the move, plotting, romancing Goneril and Regan, achieving his objectives with ruthless efficiency. The character, akin to Iago, is intellectually driven and completely devoid of empathy. Myers is extremely effective in the role.Edgar (Sara Barker), on the run from his brother’s baseless accusations, becomes “Poor Tom,” a shambling, demon-ridden fugitive. Barker is exceptional in both roles, as the honest Edgar, who believes his malevolent brother without question, and as the haunted Tom, a terrible denial of identity which almost costs him his life. The casting of a female as Edgar emphasizes the modern notion of gender as a performance.

Frank Britton’s Cornwall, resplendent in a red jacket, is as mercurial and bellicose as it is possible to be. With the more morally aware but ineffective Albany (Christian R. Gibbs), he plans and schemes to find his way through the morass of the disintegrating kingdom. Britton, a formidable presence, has a physicality that works beautifully for the part. Gibbs’ understated sincerity is well-suited to his role as one of the few sympathetic characters.

Because Gloucester is played by a woman, Kent’s role as Lear’s male friend and defender becomes even more crucial. Vince Eisenson is by turns fiercely indignant, philosophical, and always provocative. Louis E. Davis finds some unusual shadings in the role of Oswald, and as Burgundy, he rejects the penniless Cordelia with brisk practicality.The Ensemble: Tiffany Byrd (Doctor/Knight/Attendant/Messenger) and Greg Watkins (First Servant/Knight/Attendant/Messenger) perform a dizzying variety of roles with enormous commitment.

The creative team, Director Tom Prewitt, Scenic Designer Jonathan Dahm Robertson, Lighting Designer John D. Alexander, and Sound Designer and Composer Justin Schmitz have worked wonders in this small space. There is lightning which seems to break over the audience, evocative music at just the right time, and a set which suggests the environment without being distracting. The costume design by Elizabeth Ennis is eclectic. Goneril and Regan, fittingly in red and black, make a lovely pair of harpies. Cordelia is in white, another traditional choice. The men’s costumes have a largely military aspect. Fight Choreographer Casey Kaleba builds in combat which is enlivening and believable.

This King Lear has the core of elemental truth which is so hard to describe and so difficult to attain. The great lines come at us in a new way, as part of a brutal world which is paradoxically filled with kindness and acts of love. It is the perfect antidote to 24-7 media, which seems to turn everything into a tweet or a car commercial. The pain here is close to the surface, and real.

Director Tom Prewitt and his cast have crafted a Lear who would be at home in today’s headlines. Covfefe.

Is it possible to learn something new from a 400-year-old play? Yes, if the play is rich in insight and wisdom; if the production is attentive to detail and willing to take risks; and if there is a commitment to excellence by the company. WSC Avant Bard’s King Lear succeeds on all three counts, and so may be the best theater in Washington right now.We think of Lear as the monarch who botched his succession plan, but he is more than that. Lear is the widower who has finally moved in with his daughter’s family and learned that bedtime is 10 PM and that he is no longer allowed to smoke cigars. Lear is the bank president who, upon his retirement, finds that his successor will invest in credit default swaps. Lear is the mother who, upon becoming a grandmother, is told that her child-rearing practices were all wrong. Lear is the country doctor who, having sold her practice to a health care corporation, discovers that her old patients are getting pain medication instead of lifestyle counseling.

Lear is, in short, all of us, holding on to our present tenses for dear life, against the tide of history and our inevitable decay. Lear, like all of us, finds who he is in what he does. For you, it might be analyzing legislation, or dramaturgy; for Lear, it is being King of England. Lear decides to surrender the cares of office (as most of us do, sooner or later); the challenge, for him and for us, is to do so without surrendering himself. King Lear is about his failure to do so — he loses kingdom, self, and everything dear to him.In WSC Avant Bard’s intimate production, Lear is as much a story of a father as it is a story of a King. We see it immediately, in Jonathan Dahm Robertson’s unsettling set: uneven strips hang from above; in the background are panels of what appears to be a geodesic dome shattered by bazookas. We are unmoored in time, in the Kingdom of rags. Lear (Rick Foucheux, capping off his superb career with this highly satisfying performance) strides into Court, surrounded by minions. “Gloucester,” he barks out. (In an inspired touch, director Tom Prewitt has turned Gloucester female, played by the excellent Cam Magee. This will open up very provocative options later.) “Attend the Lords of France and Burgundy.” This is not a persuasive leader; this is dad, directing dinner arrangements.

We all know what happens next, but we don’t know why. Lear is prepared to step off the throne, and give his kingdom up to his three daughters in equal shares, under certain preconditions: a hundred knights remain in his retinue, and he is (and they are) to have free access to his daughter’s homes, and also the “sway, revenue, execution of the rest”. He then requires his daughters to profess their love to him in the most grandiose manner possible. Goneril (Alyssa Sanders) and Regan (Charlene V. Smith), oozing insincerity, offer their fealty in terms usually reserved to catechists addressing their deity. Cordelia, his favorite, (Kathryn Zoerb) offers none — “I love your majesty according to my bond”. Lear responds by disinheriting Cordelia and dividing his Kingdom between his more fulsome daughters, and when his loyal lieutenant, Kent (a fabulous Vince Eisenson), attempts to intervene, Lear banishes Kent.

Is Lear a suppurating narcissist, who makes his decisions from a soft cradle of lies? Perhaps, though it is unlikely that so ill-equipped a leader would have been so successful a King. The anxious, tumbling way Foucheux approaches his speeches here suggests another explanation: that Lear knew the peril he would be in once he gave up his throne, and needed his heirs to, in this public place, swear a fealty so far-reaching that they could not deny it later without fear of fomenting rebellion.

Of course, it doesn’t work. Goneril and Regan immediately scheme to rein in their impulsive father, and if Lear doesn’t realize that he has condemned himself by surrendering power, he has his Fool (Christopher Henley, as good as I’ve seen him) to tell him. (When Lear asks, “Dost thou call me fool, boy?” the Fool answers “All thy other titles thou hast given away; that thou wast born with.”)

So established, King Lear almost writes itself. Lear, divested of his Kingdom in favor of his children, gradually is divested of his selfhood. Goneril and Regan are both self-obsessed sociopaths who believe that their own rise to power is overdue, but their complaints against Lear are not without justice. The old King’s raucous retinue has caused much disruption in the Kingdom Goneril and her husband Albany (Christian R. Gibbs) rule, and when he decides to make a premature visit to the Kingdom Regan shares with her husband, the ruthlessly aggressive Cornwall (Frank Britton), they are unprepared for the demands of Lear and his large staff. This is not simply the story of the good King betrayed by his treacherous children; this is the story of the surrender of power to the next generation, whether in family, business, or state.

There is a subplot, involving Gloucester. She has two sons: Edmund (Dylan Morrison Myers), who was born out of wedlock, and Edgar (Sara Barker). Edmund is as ruthlessly ambitious as anyone in this play, and twice as clever; he implicates Edgar in a plot to overthrow their mother and, with his half-brother out of the way, proceeds to overthrow their mother. That done, he sets his designs on England itself, romancing Goneril and Regan alternately as he contemplates their murder, and that of their husbands.

WSC Avant Bard’s production is full of illuminating touches which makes this play both easier to understand and more important. Lear’s descent into madness seems to be a quick one, but is easier to understand if you assume, as Foucheux told me in this interview, that “he was always destined to be King…And he really considered himself a divine King.” When Lear rages, observe the number of times he glances upward. He is furious at Goneril and Regan, to be sure, but his most personal anger is directed at God. I’m Your boy, he seems to be saying. Why are You doing this to me?

The second enduring mystery to the play is the fate of the Fool. We last see him helping a stuporous Lear escape, on Gloucester’s urgent advice, to Dover; he never appears again. But in his final utterance, while under Albany’s custodial control, Lear says “my poor fool is hanged”. How does he know? What does he see?Foucheux talked about that, too. “There is that moment with [Lear] and Gloucester…he’s babbling, and there seems to be non sequiturs everywhere…Interestingly, last night…we talked about the Fool’s influence on Lear and how some of these non sequiturs and some of these things that might appear to be babbling from the King are in fact echoes of things that the Fool has said…Who is this character, the fool? Is he already a voice in Lear’s head? And nothing more?”

Henley is certainly more than a voice in Lear’s head: he is a vivid, mocking presence who torments Lear and pricks away at everyone else. But could such a creature actually exist? Dressed in clownish pinks, mincing and howling, the Fool says things to Lear far more cutting and insulting than any of the things Cordelia or Kent said that got them banished. Aside from that, the Fool radiates fear; in tense situations, he crouches down, covering his head with his hands, and when he hurls his cutting jibes, he ducks, much as a soldier throwing a hand grenade from a foxhole might. Is it possible that the only person who would be allowed to say such things to Lear is…Lear? And is it possible that this effeminate, fearful, needy Fool is the person who the hypermasculine Lear wishes he could be, at least once in a while? And when his poor fool is hanged, does Lear recognize that his own time has run out?

Finally, Prewitt’s decision to turn Gloucester’s gender enriches the play in a way that would have been impossible in Shakespeare’s time. Gloucester occupies a position somewhere between ally and subordinate; the obedience is loyal rather than servile. At the end of the play, each having been undone by untrustworthy progeny, they reach for each other free from the bonds of status and protocol. In this production, they hold each other and kiss unrestrainedly. What’s love got to do with it? Everything.Making Gloucester female accomplishes much more than that, though. With Magee as Gloucester, we get a different model of loyalty than we get from most male Gloucesters, freer of ego and without any sense of rivalry. Since our culture (like almost all) reveres the mother-child bond above all else, Edmund’s betrayal seems even more horrifying than it otherwise would. And when Cornwall exacts his terrible punishment on her (I won’t tell you what it is) the shock is so profound it is almost as though we were all profanely insulted.

By setting the play in anytime, Prewitt universalizes the story (Elizabeth Ennis’ beautiful costumes, many of which could be described as “military chic”, provide material assistance) and enables some terrific performances. Foucheux makes no effort to turn Lear into a sympathetic character, but we sympathize with him anyway because his dilemma is our own. His carefully nuanced performance opens the play up to us. Magee gives us a pitch-perfect version of a powerful woman dealing with an even more powerful contemporary; I could look at her performance and imagine Valerie Jarrett in the Obama Administration, or Condoleezza Rice in the administration of the second Bush.

Edmund is one of the best roles in all of Shakespeare and Myers gets all of it, ranting and snarling one moment and as soothing as Sominex(tm) the next. Like Richard III, he vents to the audience, but unlike Richard, Edmund is animated by the sheer joy of doing ill. Myers is absolutely credible at this; Myers’ Edmund is the character most likely to stick a shiv between your ribs.I’ve already mentioned Eisenson, who was a late addition to the cast. Kent is really the only heroic character in the play, and Eisenson helps us to understand why. He is a brave man, who tells truth to power without making too much of himself. The laconic drawl he adopts makes us see a man at ease in his surroundings; even when Cornwall puts him in stocks he accepts the humiliation with equanimity. (Amusingly, when he mockingly pretends to flatter Cornwall, he assumes a Scottish burr. That would have gone over well in 1605, when the play was first performed and England was ruled by the Scot James I.)

To appreciate how good a job Henley has done with the Fool, go back and read the play after you’ve seen it. You’ll see how hard the Fool’s line reads are; Shakespeare appeared to reserve the most archaic language for the Fool’s speeches. Yet I have never heard the Fool’s lines get more laughs than they did in WSC’s production. Henley delivers the lines with such precision, and such keen timing, that you would have to be, well, a fool not to laugh.

WSC Avant Bard operates on a small budget, but you could not tell it from the technical work, and in particular the lighting (John D. Alexander) and sound (Justin Schmitz) designs. When it was time for war, they gave us hell from the clash of armies at Thermopylae to the sound of mortar fire in Iraq. When it was time for a thunderstorm, they were so realistic that I checked at intermission to make sure that my car was not underwater.

It is always a melancholy moment when a great actor takes his leave from the stage, and as much as I enjoyed this show I know I will miss watching Rich Foucheux practice his art. There is some satisfaction, however, in seeing him finish by taking this iconic role, and imbuing it with the passion, gravitas, dignity and insight which has been his stock in trade for nearly forty years.

You won’t soon forget ‘Forgotten Kingdoms’By Celia Wren May 3, 2017

A small boy sits alone at the edge of a wooden jetty, dropping marbles into the sea. He is counting the splashing sounds the marbles make as they plummet into the waves. We can count them, too: The collision between toy and water makes a crisp, satisfying noise amid the broader susurration of the ocean.

Arriving in the first minute or two of “Forgotten Kingdoms,” this sequence exemplifies the vividness of this distinctive play by Randy Baker, receiving its world premiere from Rorschach Theatre. A tale of a troubled American missionary family and their circle of acquaintances on an isolated Indonesian island, “Forgotten Kingdoms” touches on such themes as culture clash, the legacy of colonialism and competition among religions, but it is far from an issue play. Bold, often poignant and sometimes too leisurely, the work extends an appealingly personal and idiosyncratic vision, rich in telling detail. The title may reference forgetting, but the play often seems as clear and specific as a total-recall memory.

Director Cara Gabriel capitalizes on that specificity in her production, which unfurls on, and around, an evocation of a wooden house built on stilts over the sea. (Debra Kim Sivigny designed the splendid set, as well as the costumes.) This is the home of David Holiday (Sun King Davis), who has moved to Indonesia with wife, Rebecca (Natalie Cutcher), and son Jimmy (Jeremy Gee) in hopes of spreading their Christian faith. His church has attracted congregants, but Rebecca is unhappy and Jimmy is unwell. When the Holidays receive a visit from Yusuf bin Ibrihim (Rizal Iwan), a quiet Muslim whom David has targeted for conversion, the conversation touches on such matters as the characters’ past missteps, Indonesian myth, the nature of truth and the story of Job. Along the way, the household’s uneasy peace veers into crisis.

All of the performers are quite watchable. In the biggest roles, Davis suggests cagey affability, while Iwan — a Jakarta-based Indonesian actor — convincingly exudes a reserved wariness. Also notable is Vishwas (he goes by one name), who is dynamic and engaging in the small role of a police officer. Design elements also are significant players: Sound designer Justin Schmitz contributes the invaluable ocean-wave noises that underscore the scenes. And lighting designer Tyler Dubuc artfully makes late-afternoon daylight fade into dusk and night, until you can see indoor lights gleaming between the boards of the house.

“Forgotten Kingdoms” is a long-aborning project for Baker, who is Rorschach’s co-artistic director: He grew up an American in Asia, hearing stories about his grandparents’ experiences as missionaries in Indonesia. The “Forgotten Kingdoms” script was developed in Indonesia and Malaysia, as well as in the United States.Over the course of its creation, the play acquired an enigmatic ending that some audience members may find frustrating. Others may find that the open-endedness reflects how different cultures, and different people, can gravitate to drastically differing perspectives.

“Sometimes, a greater truth is revealed when the facts are fuzzy,” says Rebecca Holiday (Natalie Cutcher) in the second act of Rorschach Theatre’s production of Randy Baker’s new play, Forgotten Kingdoms. It’s a line that not only resonates in our post-truth, “fake news” world, but perfectly encapsulates the story being told on stage.

Forgotten Kingdoms takes place on a small island in Indonesia, outside the home-on-a-pier on which Americans David Holiday and his wife Rebecca are making their lives as missionaries along with young son Jimmy. Their hanging-by-a-thread home life is thrown further into chaos by the arrival of Yusuf, the son of a well-respected local leader who has recently joined David’s flock.This production is a world premiere of Baker’s script, which was developed in Malaysia, Indonesia, and here in DC. The story is deeply personal for Baker, who was inspired to write it by his childhood growing up in Asia and the stories his grandfather, a Pentecostal missionary, would tell—and embellish. Though the events that unfold take place in 1983, the themes being addressed on stage—faith, truth, cultural exchange, forgiveness, the omnipresence of the past—are just as relevant in 2017.

As we enter this world, Yusuf’s father, who’s on death’s door, has been sent to talk to David, but he doesn’t understand why. Jimmy, he learns, has been suffering from seizures, speaking in riddles, and generally behaving oddly. His behavior has only gotten stranger since the night Jimmy joined his father as he healed a local girl through the power of his Christian faith, or so the story goes. Yusuf and David wind up engaging in a dance between Jesus and Allah, and the audience is let in on the fact that David hasn’t always been such a true believer and Rebecca may be less than thrilled with their family’s current living situation. Little do any of them know that events will soon change all their lives forever.

Baker’s script raises some thorny questions without offering any easy answers. Forgiveness is a major theme, and beyond the surface platitudes about God’s forgiveness come more nuanced quandaries about whether we ever can or should truly forgive ourselves for our past mistakes. And speaking of the past, the idea that the past is never really left behind and is, in fact, always present in the present. The characters grapple with this—for David and Rebecca, it’s their family’s past, while for Yusuf, who sees David’s presence on their island as yet another instance of his countrymen and women leaving their values and beliefs behind, it’s a matter of culture and history.

Major kudos must be given to the show’s designers; if there’s one thing that Rorschach does consistently well, it’s creating a world. Debra Kim Sivigny’s set design convincingly transforms the Atlas Performing Arts Center’s Sprenger Theater into a house on stilts, allowing for engrossing moments of theatricality—as the hanging gossamer fabrics sway in the air-conditioning, it’s easy to believe that they’re being moved by a tropical breeze instead. Justin Schmitz’s sound design expertly evokes the ocean, without ever overwhelming. The real star, however, is Tyler Dubuc’s subtle lighting design, which precisely evokes the transition to nightfall without ever calling too much attention to itself—except in the moments when it does, to dazzling effect.

Director Cara Gabriel does an excellent job of making the most of the limited space on the pier as the actors move ever-closer to the edge, both physically and emotionally.Baker’s script offers plenty of bon mots (such as when David, with all the sincerity in the world, tells Yusuf “I’m not here to judge the past; I’m here to save the future”) that have the audience laughing, sighing, and even snapping along. Unfortunately, the exposition-saturated second act fails to deliver on the momentum and build-up of the first act, which ends with an exciting and intriguing bit of action. I found myself wondering whether the play may well have been stronger had it simply ended at intermission.

Forgotten Kingdoms is an ambitious and thought-provoking bit of world-building that is sure to spark a bevy of conversations among those lucky enough to see it. Mysticism mixed with the mundanity of everyday life reveals the ambiguity and potential for both misunderstanding and forgiveness that comes when different cultures with tightly-held beliefs butt up against one another.

Randy Baker drew from his own upbringing in Asia to craft his play "Forgotten Kingdoms," getting a world premiere at Rorschach Theatre, where he is co-artistic director.Growing up as son of teachers and the grandson of a Pentacostal missionary, Baker sensed the underlying ideological friction between the incoming Christians and the Muslims of the island where they settled.

After a long road of development that began as his graduate school thesis in 2012, "Forgotten Kingdoms" was workshopped in Houston, New York and in D.C., including a staged reading at the Kennedy Center as part of the Page to Stage Festival. It got further development in the places that inspired him - Malaysia and Indonesia, including a public reading in Jakarta.Over time, it's become this tense family drama with an embedded mystery that becomes a metaphor for the promise and uses of religion.In addition to the fertile debate on the nature of faith (and the sheer presumptuousness of missionaries) there are several dramatic hooks on which to grasp. And Baker's own experience adds the kind of precise detail that makes the story, as fantastic as it becomes, rooted in truth.

A major benefit of the Jakarta readings came not only in seeing how it played to that culture, but in snagging one of its actors, Rizal Iwan, to return to make the trip to D.C. to play the role of Yusuf, the son of a local leader who is trying to come to terms with the missionary family. (He's here with help from the Indonesian embassy).The family itself is having its own problems that unravel as the play goes on. The first to be recognized is the son (Jeremy Gee), who seems to be on his own wavelength as he spends time on the home on stilts surrounded by water. The locals think he's haunted. Whether he is on the autistic spectrum or simply given to daily escapes from home because of a skittish mother is not clear. The mother, well played by Natalie Cutcher, has her own reasons for her spotty maternal style, and carries a burden of guilt because of it.The father (Sun King Davis) has a gregariousness that identifies him as a good candidate to become an evangelical pastor, but also an underlying fear of the fragility of his family based on his own less than pious past in Yakima, Wash.

Director Cara Gabriel keeps a nice balance between the immediacy of the domestic turmoil and the theological discussions on religion and cultural coercion.Deb Sevigny's considerable set - comprised of the porch of the house on stilts surrounded by water and a long jetty to get there - looks good and plays well, emphasizing the Western family's distance from the community it inhabits and attempts to influence.The water underneath is indicated by cloth roiling and enhanced by Justin Schmitz' sound, picking up the splashes of things that drop into the water, big and small. And the sounds of the ocean ebbs and flows, disappearing at times altogether in the way that one blocks the sound of the ocean out some times.Tyler Dubuc's light design is so subtle you can barely tell the sun going down and blackness engulfing the set as night falls.​All the workshopping on the play has made it a solid work indeed, and what they learn from this production will likely make it even better, as it seems just a step or two from a great American play. Which is exciting to see on H Street.

There are mysteries of belief and faith beneath this fascinating parable of a play, roiling like the seawater that churns below the wooden house where its action takes place. This house is built on stilts on the coast of a small island in Indonesia. The sounds of water lapping and surf breaking and the liquid reflections of light upon its moving surface never cease.Part cross-cultural collision, part family melodrama, part theological thriller, part audacious myth-making, Rorschach Theatre’s Forgotten Kingdoms contains such rich content it’s like riding a rip tide.

Playwright Randy Baker grew up in Singapore, grandson of a missionary, and he has set this play at the home of an American missionary based loosely on his grandfather and the stories Baker remembers he told. But beyond that biographical mooring and Baker’s lived familiarity with the locale, Forgotten Kingdoms is an act of fictive imagination that immerses its audience’s attention like a Williams or O’Neill.

David Holiday is the missionary, played by Sun King Davis with pitch-perfect preacher’s zeal, demons within to boot. His wife, Rebecca Holiday, has dutifully followed him to this remote outpost with not nearly his enthusiasm. They met in a bar in Yakima, Washington, when he was a lush and a lothario. She, already a Christian, was working there as a bartender and determined to save him. She succeeded, he turned into an impassioned man of the cloth, and now she’s stir-crazy-stuck in this house on stilts, a stay-at-home mom for their troubled and troublesome son, Jimmy, whom she calls, not inaccurately, “weird.” Susceptible to seizures, he sometimes wanders off alone without warning. (He is played with eerie authenticity by Jeremy Gee; we can believe he may be haunted, as locals say). Natalie Cutcher captures Rebecca’s conflicted affection for her husband and frustrating concern for Jimmy along with her ongoing anger and bitterness. As Rebecca puts it one point, “Hell is getting what you want.”

Hinted at there are the makings of the hellish domestic confrontation that blows up in Act Two like an electrical storm, in a scene played with gale force by Davis and Cutcher. Their dispute—about, among other things, who saved whom—delivers a jolt to the play that raises all the wattage thereafter.Act One is more measured and methodical as Baker sets forth the engrossing cross-cultural conflicts and theological arguments that underlie the action. Playing antagonist to David’s Christian triumphalism is a local named Yusuf bin Ibrihim, who is Muslim and whose wife and father attend David’s Sunday services. From Yusuf we learn of the island’s culture, the kingdom that was displaced and suppressed by colonialist kingdoms from one country after another.

We also learn David has healing powers. Or maybe doesn’t. Depends who is telling the story. And who is changing it. This is among the conundrums of faith and belief that wash ashore in Forgotten Kingdoms like messages in bottles.Yusuf’s father is dying—an offstage death that will come to be resonant with religious symbolism. And Yusuf has a strangely simpatico connection with Jimmy, who at the end figures into the religious symbolism in a breathtakingly mythic way. In the performance of Indonesian actor Rizal Iwan, Yusef is given a very moving, very soulful presence that grounds the play’s provocative spirituality.

Just before intermission there’s a shocker, the gasp-out-loud kind. This precipitates the arrival in Act Two of a fifth character, a member of David’s congregation named Officer Togar, on official investigative business, played solidly by Vishwas.

Director Cara Gabriel conducts the panoramic scope of this play with orchestral dimension. The set by Debra Kim Sivigny, who also did costumes, is alone worth the trip to H Street to see this show. (The aroma of fresh-sawed lumber lingers in the air, testament to the hand-wrought stagecraft on display.) Lighting Designer Tyler Dubuc makes this ever-flowing world beside the sea seem real. And sound Designer Justin Schmitz, whose eloquent water effects underscore all, composes an opener for each act with the sort of stirring music that typically begins big movies.​I cannot say for certain what Forgotten Kingdoms is “about.” But I sensed at every turn there is an ocean of meaning within it—like an ebb and flow of stories and emotions that touch on faith and belief yet never explain it, never contain it. And just how deep is that ocean can be known only by diving in.

Take Ten: Justin SchmitzBY MICHAEL KYRIOGLOUAPRIL 19, 2017

A sound designer with proven “moxie,” JUSTIN SCHMITZ brings his aural magic to the world premiere of Randy Baker’s Forgotten Kingdoms at Rorschach Theatrethrough May 21. Check out this week’s Take Ten to share his longing for a Ziegfeld Follies past, a Ryan Reynolds future, and a perpetual journey Into the Woods.

1) What was the first show you ever saw, and what impact did it have?The first show I ever saw that I can remember was The Nutcracker. I distinctly remember the Mother Gertrude moment in Act 2 where 45 people came pouring out from under her dress, and at 5 years of age, that was magic like I had never scene. From then I knew I wanted to create magic that everyone could love as much as I did.

2) What was your first involvement in a theatrical production?First theatrical experience was in high school during a Madrigal dinner feaste. I had sung a soprano opera aria during a concert 3 months before hand and was asked to join the cast of a show because of the moxie of the song. I ended up playing a king in the production.

3) What’s your favorite play or musical, and why do you like it so much?The running joke is that almost every musical is my favorite musical, but at the end of the day, the musical I always turn to is Into The Woods. Sondheim’s brilliance shines through in asking adults to think about the dreams we had as children, what happened to us when we got those dreams? What has become of the person we were before we got what we wanted?

4) What’s the worst day job you ever took?Ooof! That’s tough. I’d have to say dish-washing for a local tavern back in WI was the worst, it was fun working with my godmother, but I distinctly remember my back aching for days afterword. Perhaps that’s why I always seek dishwashers in apartment searches.

5) What is your most embarrassing moment in the theatre?My most embarrassing moment would have to be firing a full sequence of cues that I had created, sculpted, and rehearsed for days and days, at completely the wrong time. It completely ruined the moment and I felt just shocked that I had mis-fired a cue.

6) What are you enjoying most about working on Forgotten Kingdomsat Rorschach Theatre?The collaboration! Everyone at Rorschach is so collaborative, we’ve had amazing conversations about this piece that Randy has created, and have come together to really create amazing art.

7) Other than your significant other, who’s your dream date (living or dead) and why?Ryan Reynolds still makes me swoon. He’s got that charm and smile that makes you melt into a thousand pieces, not to mention his great ability to be a wonderful father to his child, and let’s not forget those washboard abs!

8) What is your dream role/job?My dream role/job is teaching at a university. I’ve always been a teacher at heart, and I cannot wait to one day join the ranks of professors everywhere impacting lives and bringing new people into the magical realm of sound design.

9) If you could travel back in time, what famous production or performance would you choose to see?I would absolutely love to see a Ziegfeld show in its glory days. I think being able to see that former glory of theatre performance would be a treat to see when the world wasn’t as connected as it is today, and the music of a full orchestra reigned supreme.

10) What advice would you give to an 8-year-old smitten by theatre / for a graduating MFA student?To an 8-year old: explore every opportunity you can while you grow up, never lose the magic. To an MFA graduating individual- remember the magic, remember why you chose the field; harness that feeling and use it to propel you distances unimagined. Try everything, attempt the impossible, and go with your soul.​JUSTIN SCHMITZ is a sound designer and theatre artist based in Washington DC. He has designed sound for: The Kennedy Center, The Kennedy Center’s Theatre For Young Audiences, Signature Theatre, Round House, Theater J, Olney Theatre Center, Studio Theatre, Imagination Stage, Shakespeare Theatre Company, Forum, Rorschach, WSC Avant Bard, Dixon Place, Chautauqua Theatre Company, Triad Stage, Catholic University, Gallaudet University, The University of Maryland, among others. He is a 2017 Helen Hayes Award nominee for his work on I Call My Brothers (Forum Theatre) and received fellowships from The Kennedy Center’s Kenan Institute, KCACTF to attend The Orchard Project, and Chautauqua Theatre Company. He has performed with Carol Burnett in her one-woman show Carol Burnett, Laughter and Reflection and in June, will be singing at Carnegie Hall in the Octavo Series. Justin has started a theatre company with local artists, Do Good Theatre, with a desire to use art to inspire social change. He holds a Masters of Fine Arts from The University of North Carolina School of the Arts in Sound Design for Theatre, and a Bachelor of Arts from The University of Wisconsin – La Crosse in Theatrical Design, Technology, and Stage Management Visit www.justinschmitztheatre.com or www.dogoodtheatre.com.

In 1983, experimental theatre director Lee Breuer wrote and directed a musical that became a worldwide sensation. Blending Black church gospel music and Motown with a story of Greek tragedy, Breuer’s words and Bob Telson’s score created an entirely unique adaptation of Sophocles’ play Oedipus at Colonus. No one had imagined such a fusion of cultures thousands of years apart could work, and yet Colonus manages to pull these elements into a parable about the times we live in. Now, Jennifer L. Nelson’s production at Avant Bard breathes new life into this timeless tale.

The musical follows the same plot as Sophocles’ of old, with one twist: the entire story is told through the lens of a Black church service, with a deep-voiced preacher regaling the choir and congregation with stories from “The Book of Oedipus.” The Preacher Oedipus, narrating most of the non-musical portions of the show, shares the Oedipus character with his blind Singing Oedipus counterpart. These roles are played alternately with great warmth, earth-shaking wrath and deep sadness by DeMone (Singer Oedipus) and William T. Newman Jr. (Preacher Oedipus), the latter of whom also serves as chief judge on Arlington Circuit Court.

Set after the events of Oedipus Rex, this show tells the story of Oedipus’ later life, having blinded and exiled himself in retaliation for his tragic sins. Guided by his daughter Antigone (Tiffany Byrd), he comes upon the city of Colonus, where a prophecy foretold that he should be laid to rest. He is immediately reunited with his other daughter, Ismene (Ashley D. Buster). The citizens of Colonus initially reject him—in “Stop; Do Not Go On,” they are represented by the chorus (Branden Mack, Rafealito Ross) and Balladeer (Chauncey Matthews) surrounding and hounding him in an effort to keep their city free from the stain of his sin. Their leader Theseus (A.J. Calbert) is swayed by Oedipus’ requests for grace (“A Voice Foretold,”), and allows them to stay. The sinner-turned-refugee is welcomed with opened arms, and all seems well until Oedipus’ brother-in-law Creon (e’Marcus Harper-Short), and later his son Polyneices (Greg Watkins), appear, desiring to use him for their own ends. The Women’s Ecumenical Choir provides additional vocals and audible reactions to the stories being told, aiding the idea of a church service.

Jennifer L. Nelson’s production favors intimate spirituality over the “megachurch” setting of previous interpretations. Set Designer Tim Jones places the show on top of a hill, with the piano and drums (played by Harper-Short and Abdou “CleanHandz” Muhammad, respectively) sitting at the top, directly next to the preacher’s pulpit. Leafy canopy hangs from above. Combined with Lighting Designer John D. Alexander and Sound Designer Justin Schmitz’s lifelike outdoor atmosphere that culminates in a thunderstorm at one point in the play, the production evokes the idea of a spirituality connected with nature and alludes to the Greek tradition of producing theater out in the open. The audience becomes a part of the action as actors walk through aisles and directly address people; they aren’t so much onlookers as part of the congregation, wrapped around the stage and moved to participate and respond in the tradition of black churches.Costume Designer Danielle Preston dresses all the actors in their Sunday best, with Greek-inspired flowing dresses for the women and suits and ties for the men, all in rich, royal colors and with a bit of an African touch to pattern and design.

Lee Breuer’s The Gospel at Colonus is a celebration of intense emotion. The story is one of human failing, but also of redemption and the potential for kindness, and it is told in great part through music: mournful, dark, joyful, celebratory, and always flowing from the powerful energy of the performers. Oedipus’ story becomes not so much a tragedy as a celebration of love, especially when it comes to giving refuge to outcasts—a message that still resonates today, perhaps even more than the playwright originally intended.

It’s not just that rich voices lift heavenward in WSC Avant Bard’s fine new staging of “The Gospel at Colonus.” It’s the elegance, the ceremony — the lofty mix of Greek drama, with all its grim fate, and the redemption of choral music meant to jolt you joyously out of your seat.

Jennifer L. Nelson’s lively, pocket-size production is smartly tailored for the small Theater II in the Gunston Arts Center in Arlington. The audience is only a couple of rows deep, arranged in a semicircle around a stage that looks like an ancient outcropping of rock. Propelled by musical director/keyboardist e’Marcus Harper-Short and percussionist Abdou “CleanHandz” Muhammad, the singers perform mostly without microphones. The soulful, thoughtful performances fill the room beautifully.

“The Gospel at Colonus” was a 1980s phenomenon engineered by Mabou Mines ringleader Lee Breuer, who brought his prestige hit from New York to Arena Stage in 1984 with a cast (hold your breath) of 57 that included Morgan Freeman. “Rarely has the stage appeared so full,” a Post critic wrote at the time.Nelson’s production is big for its stage, too: The cast of 10 is augmented by seven singers of minister Becky Mays Jenkins’s Women’s Ecumenical Choir. The grace of the show, though, is that it never feels swollen or pushy. It’s as dignified as church, even when it raises the roof.

Oedipus is already blind and staggering toward death in Sophocles’ later play “Oedipus at Colonus,” and the musical adaptation divides the tragic character in half. The balanced mirror images are William T. Newman Jr. as Preacher Oedipus and DeMone as Singer Oedipus, each performing with philosophical gravity. Newman brings a deep, reflective sense and rumbling tones to his role as the preacher, while DeMone’s singing draws notes of pain and hope in long, soft phrases and impassioned outbursts.

Nelson’s show looks as good as it sounds. Danielle Preston’s costumes are snappy suits for the men accented with African-themed sashes or hats, while the women get bright, timeless-looking gowns that nod toward ancient Greece. Sandra Holloway’s dances glide nicely across the small stage — no clutter — and John D. Alexander’s lights leave a lot of the room black, creating an illusion of an eternal sacred spaceIt’s not a highly plotted show, though a bit of drama is created when Creon (Harper-Short, stepping out from behind his onstage keyboard) tries to lure Oedipus away from Colonus and when Polyneices (Greg Watkins) arrives to the song “Evil” with the collar popped on his suit jacket. The cast is impressively even: A.J. Calbert is a gracious Theseus, Chauncey Matthews is a silky voiced balladeer, Tiffany Byrd and Ashley Buster are pitiable as Oedipus’s daughters-sisters, and Branden Mack and Rafealito Ross add choral strength. All around, the voices are sturdy and the demeanor is devout.

You can feel the gospel cadence in the titles of Bob Telson’s songs: “Stop: Do Not Go On!,” “Come Back Home,” “Now Let the Weeping Cease.” DeMone and the chorus make thrilling drama of “Lift Me Up (Like a Dove),” which has a dusky, rousing hook, and the finish doesn’t stoop to manipulating a standing ovation. It genuinely makes you want to rise and clap along.

ln the world premiere of I Wanna Fucking Tear You Apart, playwright and director Morgan Gould explores a friendship between two people who aren't "normal."

Fat girl Sam and gay guy Leo live together in platonic, co-dependent bliss. They have their routines, TV shows, and Chinese orders. "Team FatGay" against the world! But life is never that simple and Sam and Leo are still growing up.Their reality becomes strained the day Leo brings his "work wife" Chloe home to meet his "home wife." O'Donoghue moves about the stage like a nervous cat, sliding up and down the furniture, crossing and uncrossing her skinny legs. Almost combatant in her unsolicited praise for Leo and Sam, Chloe rubs Sam in all the wrong places, a fact that mystifies Chloe who proclaims that people like her! At one point, Chloe even feels that it's necessary to insist that Sam isn't fat, a sore point for Sam and for Gould who makes her feelings plain: "I'm fat. That's who I am."

The physical comedy is abundant and the high point of the performance. I Wanna Fucking Tear You Apart begins and ends with some kind of dance. As a pre-amble to the performance proper, Leo and Sam perform a choreographed dance to the show's namesake "Tear You Apart" by She Wants Revenge. Halfway through the play, they reunite to perform a solid routine to Lady Gag's "Bad Romance." A bit on the nose, perhaps, but in these moments, Spiezio and Heleringer truly connect.

Spiezio and Heleringer settle into their characters after an awkward first scene. Gould's approximation of happy banter is strained. Her characters and her actors are at their authentic best when they yell and cry at each other, when they literally fucking tear each other apart. Heleringer's dynamism is a welcome contract to Spiezio's weary cynicism and dogged isolationism.

Set Designer Luciana Stecconi's set is a rather cutesy apartment, the heart of which is the couch from which Leo and Sam watch their beloved Grey's Anatomy. A great deal of attention went into the myriad of weird little touches, like fairy lights or a decapitated doll's head or a ball of caution tape, that make a set feel like a home.The design team of Studio X collaborated to transform Studio Theatre's Stage 4 into something akin to a gay-man's wedding (which it is). A purple shimmer curtain disguises Leo and Sam's apartment and contributes to the party atmosphere. Sound DesignerJustin Schmitz incorporates "I Put A Spell On You" from Hocus Pocus and the theme song to Downton Abbey to hint at upcoming drama. Schmitz's soundtrack is an amalgam of nostalgia and party tracks perfectly suited to the ups and downs of I Wanna Fucking Tear You Apart.Lighting Designer Andrew R. Cissna plays a series of projections that help to narrate the play and set a funky mood. Ivania Stack designed the costumes, a series of layered utilitarian basics which mark the passage of time.​I bet that Gould had a lot of fun writing and directing I Wanna Fucking Tear You Apart. Her script is utterly relatable and highly adaptable, yet hardly predictable. And in this age of the 24-hour media frenzy, her references are remain fresh and relevant. All this boils down to a theater experience that is fun, if not exactly groundbreaking.

They are longtime friends who share an apartment, a hearty back-and-forth, and a splendid repartee of tease, criticism, support and jealousy, and multiple emotions that swirl as individuals marginalized, different, and not-accepted. Written and directed by Morgan Gould, I Wanna Fucking Tear You Apart confronts issues of acceptance, character, relationship, and place. The story is realized by long time collaborators and actors Anna O’Donoghue (Chloe) and Tommy Heleringer (Leo) who are joined by Nicole Spiezio (Sam).

Sam is the roommate of Leo. Together they bond on identity outside-the-line; she is the fat girl that nobody wants to get to know; he, the excited gay guy. They comment on the latest trends of popular culture, squeezing the remote or each other, sharing a take-out meal of Chinese, solving world problems and getting crazy. They talk over the television in cluttered conversation as random as the items on the kitchen counter. This “TV watching phone checking pair” each have a good start on an adult life and a literary career, along with a frequently opening and closing refrigerator, Doritos to put out the heat, and a relationship with history.

At the start of the evening, you catch a glimpse out on the town, the well-appareled friends exhibiting stylish overdrive dressed to the nines or tens. Later, credit captions swirl overhead, or signal the progression of time as months pass and changes evolve. Leo introduces his friend from work, Chloe, and she sparks new complexities. Played with brash innocence by Anna O’Donoghue, Chloe is a girl who can’t sit still. Is Chloe smarter than she acts, kinder than she seems or just as she appears, pretty and slim, and one of those people easy to like?

The costumes by Designer Ivania Stack add structure to each scene, and make visual the changing season or the daily tasks of work or play. Scenes can be brief or evolve quickly sometimes trailing off in mid-sentence, or with a closing door. Leo wakes Sam up late at night with music way too loud. Possibly a cause for a huge argument, here it evolves into a fierce dance of lip-synching and sofa leaping with sound moves, pleasurable and comedic, performed with abandon.

Set Designer Luciana Stecconi begins with a curtain of purple tinsel, which pulls away to a realistic city-scape apartment well-appointed with a narrow sofa and a kitchen sink with running water. The set is filled with tiny details that amuse when the eye floats away from the dialogue. The moments left in black out are given a breath by Sound Designer Justin Schmitz, at one point adding music from Downton Abbey to heighten the drama of the preceding interchange. The creative team achieves in solidifying, a professional and polished staging.

Things never stay the same. As I Wanna Fucking Tear You Apart reminds, the passage of time may not heal, but the widening circle of friendship can let others in and honesty to survive. Morgan Gould has written a play that captures central and poignant moments of experience.

Like a fantasy disco, I Wanna Fucking Tear You Apart opens all glitz and glamour. Yet, it isn’t as frivolous as it would want you to believe watching Sam (Nicole Spiezio) and Leo (Tommy Heleringer) strut the stage in outrageous gold and black attire fit for a burlesque-like-ball. Day-to-day life for Team Fat-Gay, as they like to call themselves, which includes loving diet coke, Top Chef, Lady Gaga, and each other, is really rather blah.Roommates Sam and Leo have known each other for 10+ years (since college) and finish each other’s sentences. They have a million inside jokes. And once choreographed “Bad Romance” (and the dance is actually quite good). Like a lot of best friends, they bring out joy in one another. And are a pure joy to watch, especially as they have a faux-orgasm over Loehmann’s latest or engage in a water fight.

Yet, something is amiss. Sam cleans Leo’s room, loans him money, creates a writing schedule to hold him accountable to his craft. Leo wants to be an individual, and an adult, something unlikely when Sam doesn’t allow him to test his own agency and responsibility. Sam isn’t particularly controlling, just afraid of who she is without the person she deems her better half. Afraid to the point that she treats him with kid gloves instead of honesty.Enter Chloe (Anna O’Donaghue). Perky. Bohemian. Always bubbly (and a bit obnoxious). She is Leo’s “work wife” at his lame day job and the anti-Sam, who dresses mostly in black and wears sarcastic judgment like a Purple Heart. Chloe is thin and sweet and even funny, though Sam brushes her off with some serious side-eye.

That is, until Chloe becomes a real threat to Sam’s friendship with Leo. “You confuse disinterest for dislike,” Sam says in response to Chloe asking why she hates her.Stylistically, Wanna is done like a movie, complete with opening credits and a curtain-call worthy of film. Some scenes are so short, they are the theatrical equivalent of a Polaroid or a music video montage depicting beautiful, brief moments between friends. It also has a killer soundtrack, one that’s all about pop culture. Madonna’s “Vogue,” The Cranberries’ “Linger,” and the themes from Sex and the City, Downton Abbey, Friends, and Golden Girls all drive not only those quick scenes (and quick scene changes), but also the whole pace of the show, which covers about 5 years from start to finish.​

But what really drives it is the witty, funny dialogue delivered with ninja precision by its three actors, especially Spiezio and Heleringer who, as Sam and Leo, are like a classic comedy duo mixing it up at a college keger. And, when they drop their funny, the weight of the relationship and its flaws are splayed out perfectly.Watching Sam handle the revelation that Leo is moving in with Chloe is like watching a car crash because of driver overcorrection, which seems about right for someone like Sam, who has carried the feeling of rejection—for being fat and, therefore, unwanted—for so long that she imposes her own self-hate onto others. Especially anyone not a “freak,” like petit, cheery, sweet Chloe, who is really just a person like all people trying to make the most of what she’s got. Except, Sam doesn’t realize she has so much more than just Leo, her clutch. Her friend in a freak-dom that doesn’t really exist, if it ever did.Perhaps what is so good about this wonderful, laugh-out-loud, funny show is that it captures that one friendship/relationship everyone has had. That one that seems almost too good to be true. The one that defines you, just when you need defining, and helps guide you out of awkwardness. The one that, if you aren’t careful, will swallow you whole if you don’t let it go at the right time. And, it does it without being overly sentimental, or cheesy. It aims for a bittersweet spot and sticks the landing, thanks to a great script and direction—both done by Morgan Gould—and superb acting.​I Wanna Fucking Tear You Apart is a comic jewel masking the bruised heart we all carry.

Review: 'The How and the Why' at Theater Jby Ravelle BrickmanFebruary 21, 2017

The How and the Why – Sarah Treem’s celebrated play about science, feminism and generational rivalry – has just made its long-awaited DC debut at Theater J.The two-handed play is billed as a “fitting follow-up” to Theater J’s recent production of Copenhagen, in which two real-life male scientists – Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg – conduct an imaginary debate about the morality of turning atomic fission into a bomb.In The How and the Why, we have two female scientists. On top, and lording it over her domain, is the powerful Zelda Kahn, played by Valerie Leonard, whose theory of evolutionary biology has become establishment doctrine.

On the bottom, and beseeching some kind of favor, is the upstart Rachel Hardman. Played by Katie deBuys with alternating waves of bravado and fear, she is a graduate student whose new theory – developed with her boyfriend – threatens to overthrow existing ideas.While the characters are fictional, the science is real. In fact, the new theory, which sounds naïve, is actually based on the work of a real scientist, Margie Profet, who in 1993 shocked the world with an idea that studies have since confirmed.The play begins when the two women meet in the professor’s office just a few days before a major international conference. Rachel wants to speak at the conference. Zelda at first refuses, then, improbably, offers the opportunity, provided that Rachel will deliver the talk alone. They argue, conducting a verbal duel that covers everything from the morality of ambition to the underpinnings of sexism. They also debate the importance of love and marriage versus career. There are also some not-so-subtle hints of an earlier relationship. Is this a May-December love affair gone sour? A bond between mentor and acolyte, broken by an overly competitive student? A generational divide that has somehow turned personal?? In fact, it’s none of the above.Since the playwright is Sarah Treem—the highly-acclaimed TV writer whose hit shows include House of Cards, In Treatment and The Affair—the jousting is glib, full of laugh-aloud jokes.These two ladies are very smart. And they are smartly directed by Shirley Serotsky, an award-winning pillar of the DC theatre community who understands how to work in depth.

In fact, Adam Immerwahr, Theater J’s new Artistic Director, chose the play, in part, because it was a perfect fit for Shirley. “Her interest in feminism and focus on illuminating subtext make her ideal for this play,” he says, adding that it was also a perfect fit for his first year at Theater J.Immerwahr, who came across the play when he was Associate Artistic Director at the McCarter Theatre in Princeton, NJ—where it had its world premiere in 2011—says he was captivated by it at the time, and knew that he wanted to produce it again.​ This production owes much of its strength to its two actors. Although the character of Zelda is more fully developed—she is, seemingly, the stronger of the two, and her part is meatier—the character of Rachel allows for a broader range.

Paige Hathaway’s set is ingenious. The backdrop – covered with photographs of the professor’s subjects and snatches of pre-feminist poetry – is juxtaposed against a façade of 19th century brick buildings, each with its own mullioned windows. A movable interior wall creates the illusion, on one side, of a cozy Harvard office, complete with window seat and books. Turned around, the other side becomes a student bar where the only food is stale popcorn. In addition to the popcorn – which triggers laughter even before the first taste – Kevin Laughon’s props include a bottle of lukewarm champagne served in a coffee mug and a water glass.Danielle Preston’s costumes and accessories—especially the handbags that both tote around, provide instant clues to the women’s roles. The dominant and self-assured Zelda is clearly the Alpha Female, dressed impeccably in a designer jacket and loose but graceful trousers. Rachel, on the other hand, is the cocky post-grad outfitted in tights and layered top.

The contrasting worlds of professorial eminence and student decadence are clearly delineated by the lighting, designed by Martha Mountain, and sound, by Justin Schmitz.​That play, too, depicts a “how and a why,” though the question there is whether science and spirituality can coexist. Both plays deal with serious topics, and both are cleverly written, though contrived. Both deal with events that strain credibility. If The How and the Why occasionally feels like soap opera, at least it is soap opera laced with Pinteresque dialogue. Or it’s a Neil Simon comedy with zingers intact, but a big question mark behind the scenery.

​Review: ‘Bloody Poetry’ at The Catholic University of Americaby John StoltenbergOctober 17, 2016

Bloody Poetry kicked off the school’s 2016-2017 season, which aims, an online note says, to “examine what dreams and nightmares motivate people to seek a better future.” The 1984 play by Howard Brenton is about English lit notables Percy Bysshe Shelly and Lord George Gordon Byron and their circle of mistresses, hangers-on, and wives.

Though hoity-toity literary in its language, Bloody Poetry depicts its protagonists’ loves and lusts with the lurid candor of the National Enquirer and Real World. If you were looking for a play to catch the attention of an academic crowd who wouldn’t be caught dead in a dead poets society, Bloody Poetry would be a relatable pick. Given all the play’s historically accurate sexual goings-on, the Romantic Age might well be called the Randy Age. The text is also very frank about the era’s rampant STDs, so there’s a subtle safer sex message as well.

The school’s resources were well deployed. Costume Designer Julie Cray-Leong provided beautifully lacy gowns for the ladies and handsome vests and great coats for the gents. Scenic Designer Jonathan Dahm Robertson’s evocative painted backdrop could seem both land and sea. Lighting Designer Dr. Tom Donahue’s plot worked well (though a quite a few cues seemed too abrupt). Director Gregg Henry created some powerful stage pictures and tell-tale tableau and made wonderful use of the wide wine-red curtain, which at one point was hoist by Bysshe like a sail and at another became the water in which his abandoned wife Harriet Westbrook drowned herself. And Sound Designer Justin Schmitz offered a simply stunning soundscape—one of the finest I can recall hearing in live theater. It ranged from lovely interludes of classical music to a undertones of undulating sea and seemed the compelling emotional underscore of the entire production.

The challenge of Brenton’s script for actors is that because it is so literary, so high-flown poetic (really, it invites later reading it’s so lush), it presents a temptation to declaim and proclaim at the expense of finding and feeling the characters’ inner emotional lives. And the cast, while uniformly appealing and earnest, rarely avoided that textual trap. To paraphase Robert Browning (and perhaps discern CUA’s intent in selecting this challenging play), student actors’ reach should exceed their grasp. Because that’s how they’ll get better.

DC Metro Theater Arts: Review: 'The Call' at University of Maryland's School of Theatre, Dance, and Performance Studies at The Clarice.by Ramona Harper10-2-16

Annie and Peter, a white married couple, haven’t been able to conceive a child of their own so they decide to adopt a child from Africa. Rebecca and Drea, a newly married African American lesbian couple are Annie and Peter’s close but “only black friends” who enlighten the couple with straight talk about the challenges of being white parents to a black child.

Tanya Barfield’s The Call, performed by the University of Maryland’s School of Theatre, Dance, and Performance Studies, and directed by Eleanor Holdridge, is a contemporary conversation about some of the most taboo but right-on-time topics in American society today. Race and cultural stereotypes, international adoption and cross-cultural parenting, The Call confronts some of our deepest and sometimes darkest attitudes about family and friendship as it courageously shines a bright spotlight on the universal need for love.

The beautifully appointed, urban chic living room of Annie and Peter is the West Elm, high-end setting for a series of heated after-dinner talks as Rebecca and Drea force Annie and Peter to consider some of the potential problems of parenting a child from Africa. In sometimes wickedly funny banter, the couples deal with everything from how Annie is going to deal with black hair to giving the child a culturally correct name. That doesn’t mean Annie’s waspy Anglo choice, “Emma Elizabeth” either, if it’s a girl; and Annie confidently retorts that there are YouTube videos to help her deal with the black hair problem.

The Call digs into psychic motivations, subliminal reservations, and the aspirational limitations that complicate the desire to make a difference by helping those less fortunate. It reveals attitudes of blind sighted cultural superiority but the story line ultimately sees the light through the power of an old African folk tale. Jamaal Amir McCray gives a dramatically spirited portrayal as Alemu, Annie and Peter’s new African next door neighbor, who delivers that wisdom straight from The Motherland. Alemu becomes a central character when Annie gets “the call” from the adoption agency and she decides not to accept a child who is much older than the infant they had hoped for. Jacqui Joke Hammond, vocal coach, might need to work with Jamaal a bit more, however, on his African accent that was totally charming but sounded more Eastern European than Sub Saharan.

The vulnerability that comes with the possibility of not being accepted as birthmother; the lack of courage to pursue the primal desire to parent; and the disappointments and mixed emotions that come with friendship are universal themes that create palpable dramatic conflict. However, the playwright doesn’t completely resolve them. The play feels brief to adequately develop the heavy themes in The Call and it seemed as if more time was needed to explore them. But perhaps this is the hidden strength of The Call – it’s not over when it’s over. It leaves you with unanswered questions that you still need to mull over, encouraging lingering conversations well after one leaves the theater.

The actors in this ensemble work very well together and give first-rate performances delivering Tanya Barfield’s contemporary dialogue with balanced energy and exceptionally fine acting.

Rachel Grandizio played Annie with likable neurotic anxiety and Theo Couloumbis as Peter is a natural actor who sensitively approached an intense climax scene with Annie without taking himself too seriously. Summer Brown as Rebecca gave a standout performance as Annie’s best friend and she strengthened the bonds of friendship between all of the characters.

Sound Designer Justin Schmitz piped wonderful strains of modern African music in the background as Dylan Uremovich’s dimmed lights shifted scenes with well-placed brownouts. Set Designer Tyler Herald’s visually appealing moving sets helped to create a fashionably contemporary mood. The set was outstanding and equaled anything I have seen in professional venues.​The Call is an excellent production that delivers an important message worth hearing: the courage to love has no cultural bounds.

In its subconscious wisdom, Washington theater has kicked forth at least two 9/11 shows so far this month: the feel-good musical “Come From Away” at Ford’s Theatre and now the harrowing drama “I Call My Brothers” at Forum Theatre. In Forum’s grim, intense staging at Silver Spring’s Black Box Theatre, that city is supposedly Washington, and scheduling the show’s official opening Sunday only intensified the connection. Already staged in Europe and Manhattan, the play is written with enough ambiguity to apply to any number of settings during the past 15 years.

The script is almost too ambiguous for its own good, though. Khemiri structures the drama as a series of phone conversations between a man named Amor and his friends and relatives, and the context is the urgency of the bombing. Details are vague, and sentences frequently trail off before subjects can be locked down. The idea is to ratchet up suspense but also to leave copious room for doubt and questioning. Exactly what is going on?

Amor turns out to be rather unreliable, as we see in a scene involving a girlfriend he may have stalked and in an encounter with a hardware salesman he awkwardly tries to bond with as “one of us.” Characters frequently say the equivalent of “It didn’t happen that way” before the record gets revised. The play can be low-key, conversational, even funny as Amor jokes around with a pal. But mostly the story is told with a heavy case of the jitters. To a degree, that suits Khemiri’s aim of exploring Amor’s shattered sense of self as a Muslim in a Western city during a moment of terrorist violence — a first-rate subject for a play. Yet Amor and his plight stay at arm’s length in this highly styled production that amps anxiety to maximum levels.​Director Michael Dove leaves the stage bare and black, piercing the darkness with harsh white light that often comes from the sides or from vertical fluorescent tubes around the stage. The show has the look and feel of an emergency, with explosions sometimes booming through the sound system and with dim black-and-white video portraits of the four actors appearing on large screens as the audience gathers.A lot of the dialogue is spoken into microphones. It’s a profoundly mechanized performance.

I can nearly always count on the small, but mighty Forum Theatre to conjure up selections each season that are a little out-of-the-box, and present them with an abundance of creativity. Season 13 is no exception, and it starts off with the area premiere of Jonas Hassen Khemiri's I CALL MY BROTHERS (translated from Swedish by Rachel Willson-Broyles). In the intimate Silver Spring Black Box Theatre, Director Michael Dove and his strong cast of four deal well with the challenges and potential inherent in Khemiri's script, and give the audience a relevant night of theatre that ends - appropriately - with more questions than answers.

Based on an article written in response to the bombing in Stockholm in 2010, the play explores the plight of a Middle Eastern man named Amor (Ahmad Kamal) following a car bombing in his unnamed city. The question is not so much whathappened, but rather how Amor internalizes the event as a man who others might regard as suspicious by virtue of his race and religion. As Amor comes to terms with the event and goes about his daily life, he is filled with fear although he tries to blend in the best he can. As he goes on with life, he converses with others in his past and present via telephone. The telephone conversations he has are a blend of fantasy with reality, but give us some insight as to who Amor is, and the types of experiences he has had in his life. The ways that Amor and his friends/relatives remember these conversations is quite often different. There are no facts. Every piece of information, or response to an action, is filtered through an individualized processor.

While Khemiri explores macro issues of race, and especially the role it plays in the human/social response to terrorism in a unique way (i.e. focusing on one individual) a strong and surprisingly comedic start is followed by a messy and repetitive middle, and then a strong ending. With some tightening of the conversations Amor has, it's possible I would have left with less of a feeling of being hit over the head with an array of existing - and at times simplistic - ideas about human behavior, albeit in an artistic way. If Khemiri would have trusted all of his material more, I may have felt differently.

Still, Dove and his cast do everything they can to bring out the best in Khemiri's script. Mr. Kamal, in particular, does an incredible job at displaying Amor's unease in the aftermath of unspeakable tragedy. If it had not been made known that he only stepped into the role recently (replacing Maboud Ebrahimzadeh who was cast in a touring production of DISGRACED), I would probably have never known. Script issues aside, Kamal made me care about Amor's plight. Saleh Karaman, Nora Achrati, and Sarah Corey also contribute greatly to the production's success thanks to their versatility, and willingness to embody any given character that comes into contact with Amor - whether in real life or in his mind - within a second or two. The ensemble acting in this production is simply stellar, and is reason enough to go see the show.

Speaking of stellar, so too are the artistic elements which enhance the urgency and grimness of Khemiri's play. Whether it is Max Doolittle's harsh, fluorescent lighting or Justin Schmitz's loud and intense sound design, we are immediately transported into the unsettled chaos that is Amor's mind. A decision to have the actors use corded mics to execute telephone conversations also has artistic merit given the ideas on human behavior and interaction that Khemiri presents for our consideration. Even as the muddled middle unfolded, I remained interested in what Khemiri had to say thanks to the acting and the design.

When the wind howls do you answer it by building a shelter or by building a kite? Forum Theatre answers by not only building a kite but flying it through an emotionally turbulent storm with their 13th season opener, with the DC-area debut of I Call My Brothers, ... this gripping and visceral tale explores the narrative experience of Amor, an average individual in an average American city, doing his best to blend in, be invisible, and not raise suspicion simply by existing. Strikingly suited for the current political climate, this 90-minute high-octane emotional surge sizzles with hot-button topics like racial stereotyping and profiling and destabilizes the audiences’ preconceived notion of what exactly it is they are seeing and hearing.

Jarring and startling are the words that best describe the combined approach of Lighting Designer Max Doolittle and Sound Designer Justin Schmitz when it comes to the beat structure of Khemiri’s play. Visually disarming and aurally alarming, Doolittle and Schmitz work together to paint the audience with a sense of discomfort, a sense of disquiet. This primes theatergoers for the highly exposed nature of the story that’s about to unfold: a car has exploded; the city is crippled with fear. In addition to these unsettling moments of audio-visual sensationalism, Doolittle is responsible for the cleverly crafted spotlight circles that focuses the performers into tight moments of isolation. The illuminating elements of the show become a masterful character of sorts, filling in the gaps in the skeletal framework of Director Michael Dove’s minimalist set design. Projections Designer Hannah Marsh infuses an imitation of live-feed grayscale imagery, which features all four performers, as if they are the eyes forever watching. This replicates the symbolic paranoia that Amor feels throughout the performance and is a strong visual image to pair with the concept. As mentioned, Schmitz assists both Doolittle and Marsh with their craft by spinning a unique sound plot, articulated to enhance certain moments of emotional overflow with exacting care.​Playwright Jonas Hassen Khemiri has penned a profound piece of theatre, almost poetic in its descriptive nature with vivid language that ensnares the attention early on. In the hands of leading player Ahmad Kamal, who takes on the main role of Amor, this intentionally deliberate phrasing and use of descriptive imagery exposes emotional depth in the text as well as paints a disturbing experience for all to see. Continually blindsiding the audience with the upheaval of circumstances, every time the play gets its footing or the audience gets a clear notion of what exactly they’re witnessing. Is this a story about a terrorist? Is this a story about a terrorizing experience? Is this a story about injustice and racial profiling? Is this a story about struggle? Or perhaps it is all of the above? Khemiri loads a theatrical powder keg with his script; Michael Dove and the four-person cast ignite it into a theatrical explosion of unapologetic cathartic experiences and narratives that seize the audience and throw them headlong into a chasm of chaos.

A true bang, I Call My Brothers will spark conversation beyond the shadow of a doubt, making it the perfect way to start Forum Theatre’s 13th season.

Forum Theatre has a knack for picking trenchant works of theater that buzz with relevance to hot-button topics. Its current offering is a perfect case in point. Given this nation’s rising tide of Islamophobia in the turbulent wake of 9/11, Forum Theatre’s bold season opener, I Call My Brothers, could not be more timely or more urgent to be reckoned with.

The script is both expressionist fable and memory play. It takes us into the life and psyche of an Arab man named Amor in the aftermath of a suicide car bombing. Amor had nothing to do with the crime; he’s completely innocent. A lone radical did it, someone who wore a keffiyeh. Yet because Amor fits the terrorist’s ethnic profile, he is instantly under citywide suspicion and at constant risk of racist reprisal. At one point Amor’s friends spell out for him the desolating implications. The goal is to blend in. The goal is to become invisible. Leave your keffiyeh at home. Do not carry a suspicious bag…. Smile at everyone and everything… Apologize for existing… You are not safe anywhere…. Don’t attract anyone’s attention…

Time in the play is fractured. Scenes jump-cut. A structured tension in the text keeps every moment on edge. In contrast to the crisis that has defined Amor’s world since the explosion that rocked it, we get glimpses in fragments of Amor’s everyday relational life: scenes with his best friend, his brothers, his cousin, the woman he’s enamored of who doesn’t love him back. But the relationship that haunts him is the relationship between himself and the bomber. In one of the most profound and troubling moments of a play that is full of them, he says: “I’m not sure how much of it is in my head, you know?”

Khemiri’s text as originally translated by Rachel Willson-Broyles has been seamlessly Americanized by Forum such that the play seems to echo the emotions of countless people of color who live similarly in fear here. And the spectacular Forum production directed by Artistic Director Michael Dove leaves no nerve unfrayed. Lighting Designer Max Doolittle, Sound Designer Justin Schmitz, and Projections Designer Hannah Marsh in particular have devised cunning and stunning effects.

Audiences may differ in their experience of the plethora of special effects in the show—sudden shifts to amplification, line-by-line light cues, shocking flashes and crashes. Combined with the relative emotional remoteness in the portrayal of the central character, this could have an alienating effect (and not in a good Brechtian way).And really, this is a play that wants no distance between us. This is a play whose emotional truths we need to feel even though they be not our own. Forum Theatre is to be commended for bringing I Call My Brothers to the Silver Spring Black Box and for demonstrating once again the indispensable power of theater to connect us internationally and close to home.

Washington, DC, 2:16 AM, a car bomb goes off in a supposed terrorist attack. The suspect is a Middle Eastern-looking man with a beard. Amor is a Washingtonian of Middle Eastern descent with a beard and a large backpack who just needs to run a few errands the day after the bombing. In the middle of a town encouraged to say something if you see something, how can Amor go about his normal life without raising suspicion? Intense and visceral, I Call My Brothers is a portrait of the lasting psychological effects of being subjected to and internalizing racism.

Written by Jonas Hassen Khemiri in response to a terrorist attack in his native Stockholm, I Call My Brothers is an immersive look into the internal workings and emotional state of man who is an outsider in his own hometown. Amor is a stand-up guy. A sensitive and insightful science-lover who was bullied as a kid. He’s the guy everyone in his family goes to when they need help. But as we follow Amor over the 24 hours after the bombing, through direct address monologues and phone calls with his best friend, cousin, and others, we learn that Amor may not be exactly as he seems. There’s some anger hiding underneath the surface of his outwardly sweet and accommodating personality. He’s kind of a loner. His relationship with his good friend Valeria may have crossed the line from unrequited love to stalking. He carries a knife. Does Amor have a dark side? Or is he a man whose motivations are misinterpreted when viewed through the lens of his ethnicity?

Kamal’s affecting central performance is supported by an expert and engaging cast playing multiple characters, all giving standout performances. Staging and design choices that are simple, stark and suspenseful transport the audience inside the tumultuous state of Amor’s mind and emphasize the idea that he is under suspicion. Bright white circles of light, as if from interrogation room lamps, cross the stage in regular intervals, interrupted by jarring, blinding bright flashes like flashlights or flashbulbs and an ominous booming sound. The spare set is decorated with black and white video projections that look like surveillance video. Actors speak into microphones to denote when characters are speaking on the phone, amplifying Amor’s feelings of isolation.

The skill of the cast and artistic team bring a confidence and precision to a script that has the same jumbled timeline and abrupt changes in direction of a mind in the midst of intense anxiety and emotion. This is not a plot-based play, and those who prefer events that move forward with clarity may find I Call My Brothers frustrating. But it is thought-provoking and asks important questions without giving easy answers. By taking a visceral and emotional approach to a timely topic, I Call My Brothers makes an impression that will stay with you for days.

When was the last time you had a truly suspenseful evening at the theatre? Not suspenseful in a "whodunit" sort of way. Suspenseful in that the play kept you guessing and you never knew what would come next. This is exactly what you experience in Forum Theatre's chilling production of Martin McDonagh's The Pillowman. Let's be clear, this play is not for everyone. Those who know McDonagh know that his work usually features dark humor, dreary situations and characters with a penchant for excessive foul language and violence. The Pillowman is no exception. However, while in some of his plays, specifically the brilliant Lieutenant of Inishmore, all those attributes are used to convey a message, with The Pillowman what we're left with is a murky resolution.

That's not to take away from Forum's production which is exceptionally well-acted by a stellar cast and features a chilling production design. . The Pillowman's plot revolves around a writer named Katurian (Maboud Ebrahimzadeh) living in a totalitarian state who finds himself in jail. Unaware of why he's being detained, Detectives Tupolski (Jim Jorgensen) and Ariel (Bradley Foster Smith) reveal that several children have recently been murdered in a fashion similar to characters in his stories.

McDonagh is not bashful in hiding the disturbing nature of Katurian's stories or the gruesome deaths of the children. It's just that these details become so explicit, so heavy, that they tend to puncture the play's humor. What we're left to ponder is why we're watching this dismal situation. What keeps us intrigued are some solid performances led by Ebrahimzadeh, who anchors the production. He gives a wonderfully nuanced performance as Katurian, effortlessly channeling the character's various layers. There's the passionate storyteller, devoted brother and street-smart prisoner all of which we see in his relationships with each of the other characters. The strongest connection is between Katurian and his developmentally disabled brother Michal (James Konicek). The brotherly bond is expertly developed with skill by Konicek. His Michal is equal parts charming, naïve, cunning and unhinged, yet we can't help but feel for his character.

Much of dark comedy we come to expect from McDonagh is dispatched to Tupolski and Ariel, perfected by Jorgensen and Smith. Each cop has his idiosyncrasies, which Smith in particular, uses to great effect. He's able to channel Ariel's life goals and repressed rage to give a performance that is satirically funny. Fans of Joseph Heller's Catch-22, will find traces of that humor in The Pillowman. Jorgenson's Tupolski is the real wild card with a performance that is wickedly deranged. Equally, if not more, twisted then Ariel, Jorgenson always leaves us guessing about his character's next move. It's that suspense which, despite the play's flaws, keeps us hooked.

The situation is made all the more intense by a terrifically eerie production design. Forum's black box theatre has been turned into one giant detention room courtesy of Set Designer Paige Hathaway. In the center of the room is a small cell that allows the audience to feel as if they're apart of Ariel and Tupolski's inquisition.The cold, drab cinderblock cell walls conjure up Soviet style construction and Jason Arnold's masterful lighting design and Justin Schmitz thrilling sound design enhance the feel of living under a dictatorship. Schmitz has anthems from former Soviet bloc countries greet patrons as they enter. It's a nice, cheeky touch. Once the play begins, he creates a haunting, foreboding feeling that places the audience inside the jail. Arnold's best work though is when Katurian's stories are projected inside his cell. The lighting design quickly turns a childlike dream sequence into a nightmare by having the puppet's shadows grow increasingly menacing. Director Yury Urnov's approach has the cast utilize the whole theatre giving the production a fluidity that mostly succeeds ... Aside from this one moment, The Pillowman is an innovative production in its use of space, lighting and sound design.

A major pet peeve in any performance, be it play, musical, opera etc., is predictability. There's no use telling the story if the audience can see the conflict and resolution one act or one hour before it actually happens. With The Pillowman, there's none of that. Forum's chilling production will certainly keep you in suspense.

We are not animals. We are watching. But what if we are animals and are not to be trusted? Forum Theatre brings to the stage in a fully immersive and unapologetically evocative experience Martin McDonagh’s The Pillowman. Directed by Yury Urnov, this deceptively dark drama and majestically macabre tale unfolds in a surreal reality that is simultaneously in the audience’s periphery and just outside of their vision. Remarkably experiential, as the audience is quite literally the on-looking totalitarian dictatorship masses, this striking production will keep you unnaturally enthralled straight through to the show’s shocking and deeply harrowing conclusion.

The Pillowman at Forum Theatre show’s aesthetic is an enticing factor on its own, doubly so when the show becomes immersive to the point of drawing the audience into its reality from the lobby exposure onward. Fabricating a fully submerged reality where the play’s existence melts fluidly into the perceptive actuality of the audience, Set Designer Paige Hathaway, working inside the visionary parameters of Director Yury Urnov, exposes the audience to the live interrogation of writer Katurian K. Katurian by placing theatergoers directly in the midst of the events as they unfold. With a dynamically displaced three-quarters thrusted stage setup, Hathaway frames the audience so that they are the on-looking investigators. Lighting Designer Jason Arnold turns this notion on its head, juxtaposing this reality with that of a visual scoping technique wherein the audience starts the production off seeing only through the eyes of the accused, remaining in darkness so long as he is blindfolded.

Arnold’s work speaks for itself in both its dramatic effect and pure wondrous display. The luminescence and shadow play featured in ebbing waves throughout the performance creates palpable shifts in moods, whether they are to darkly alight a story as it unfurls, highlight an ugly truth as it unwinds, or blindside the innocence of a situation as it is unmasked. There is spectacle and wonder, yet earnestly achieved, in Arnold’s design work, and this furthers the immersive experience as the audience’s eyes are invited into the demented dance of shadows, silhouettes, and other unsavory sensations through the lens of his work.

Adding to the aesthetical amazement is the work of Sound Designer Justin Schmitz. Creating an aural symphony that is both distressingly beautiful and frighteningly unsettling, Schmitz fits the emotional turmoil of the show succinctly into the burbling soundscape, whether it’s the haunting music that floats along beneath the stories that are told, or the background effects featured during the initial interrogation encounter, driving home an ominous sense of foreboding around each and every sinister twist of the plot.

Completing the audience-steeped aesthetic is the work of Costume Designer Robert Croghan and Properties Designer Patti Kalil. While the outfits and props of the show are not directly integrated into the audience’s experience the way the set and other production design elements are (The Commandant’s militaristic costume excluded from such exclusions), they are more than worthy of praise if for nothing but the curious shock value that they add to the performance, particularly the hand-scrawled story of “The Tale of the Town on the River” and the unnerving faceless puppet children.

There are too many moments of perfection captured under glass like a radiant living specimen to mention in Director Yury Urnov’s work. Between the immersive hybrid of interactive theatre where the audience is not only watching but living the play and the overall stellar approach to the pacing— the first act is nearly two hours in length but feels like a mere blink in the time-space continuum— it can be said that this production is both astonishing and phenomenal. Urnov’s approach to the more brutal topics and overarching themes contained within the work are poignantly topical, particularly the direct exposure to police corruption and brutality. Augmented by the exacting work of Fight Choreographer Casey Kaleba, moments where these situations come to a head bring the audience to the edge of their seats, riveted to the action as it is pounded out onto the stage.

Ariel (Bradley Foster Smith) and Tupolski (Jim Jorgensen) not only represent but fully embody the notion of “bad cop/good cop” respectively. Smith’s portrayal of the high-strung and spastically combative type-A personality officer is an exaggerated caricature of the worst perception of overly corrupt people in positions in powerful authority. Jorgensen delivers a much subtler, milder, and calmer approach to his detective, though is not without his breaking points and progressive build-ups as the story unravels. The haughty disregard of actual justice that underscores both Jorgensen and Smith’s performances is jarring but not unsurprising; their dynamic deliveries of human beings who have become corrupted by the very profession that is meant to prevent such corruption is powerful, poignant, and pungent, packing punches to the gut with heavy weight behind them.

The stories belong to Katurian (Maboud Ebrahimzadeh) but the story itself is half his and half his brother’s tale. Michal (James Konicek) is as much the protagonist in The Pillowman as Katurian, if not more so at times, and the way the story— both in and of itself and the telling thereof— wends between the two brothers is fascinating. Ebrahimzadeh delivers his character with a striking level of vulnerability and earnestness. There is no subversion or provocation in his portrayal, only honest emotions, most of which translate plainly across his vividly expressed face. When Ebrahimzadeh delves into ‘storytelling mode’ either directly to the audience, like in cases of “The Writer and The Writer’s Brother” or in “The Little Jesus”, he becomes a vessel of words that transports the tale to our ears and our ears to the tale. When engaging in stories that he tells directly to Michal, such as “The Pillowman” and “The Little Green Pig”, Ebrahimzadeh takes on a much more animated tone, knowing that his tales are meant to reach the inner childlike mentality of his brother.

Konicek, as the damaged brother, toes a fine line in portraying this character as such. With a present mindfulness of childlike naiveté, Konicek delivers the epitome of balance to Michal in keeping him simple but not stupid, convivial without falling into the archetype of the mentally-challenged adult. The compassion with which he imbues certain aspects of the character’s affectation— like nervous responses or irritated flare-ups— are manifested in a mostly physical fashion and these rings true to the way in which McDonagh has penned Michal. Konicek’s energy seems indefatigable, and he is perpetually in motion, even when at rest or cowering into a stillness, cajoled there by his brother. The fraternal relationship that is portrayed between Konicek and Ebrahimzadeh is one tested with deeper bonds than blood and held fast by a readily identifiable notion of love and protection.​The story is harrowing. The story is beautiful. The story is striking and evocative, and filled with moments that shock, that strike the emotional core of humanity, that arouse our darkly amused demons which we wish to ignore. A story not to be missed, Forum Theatre’s The Pillowman is a gripping production that will leave you speechless by story’s end.

Urnov’s production is so successful because he completely nails the unholy McDonagh trifecta of violence/laughter/social commentary. The Pillowman careens back and forth between shocking tragedy and an almost giddy physical comedy. It swoops in and out of violence so black it makes it difficult to laugh… until something so funny happens that you can’t help it. This is the endless motion that makes The Pillowman so compelling – and certifies this production as indispensable viewing for fans of contemporary drama.

Of course, it isn’t solely to Urnov’s credit that Forum’s ThePillowman is so successful. It can also be chalked up to an incredible cast. Forum alumnus Maboud Ebrahimzadeh stars as Katurian K. Katurian (“my parents were funny people,” he deadpans in the first scene), Katurian’s gruesome short stories are being acted out in the real world, possibly by his mentally-challenged brother, Michal (James Konicek). This leads to some Stasi style interrogation by Detectives Ariel (Bradley Foster Smith) and Tupolski (Jim Jorgensen). The former, played by Smith, is a tough-talking cop with a fondness for electrodes. Smith’s Detective Ariel is wiry and neurotic, glowering through 1970s style aviator eyeglasses and inhaling his nicotine vaporizer (because it’s 2016, folks). By contrast, Jorgensen is a calmer, almost languid Tupolski, whose voice may even drift into lilting territory. But make no mistake: Tupolski is every bit as ruthless as his partner, and Jorgenson is nothing short of captivating as he reveals glimpses of the true sadist lurking underneath his polished exterior..Now, the first thing you will notice when your Forum Pillowman experience begins is the faux-propaganda posters that line the lobby of the Silver Spring Black Box. Then, you may see a striking woman in full Gestapo dominatrix drag (Emma Lou Hébert, who plays her multiple roles with ease and vitality) stridently giving instructions to anyone who’s around. Sealing the Orwellian deal, when you walk into the space itself, you will see that each row of the sprawling three-quarters house is separated by long, thin conference tables. Reminiscent of a government hearing or a Victorian medical theater, the seating confers a sense that us the audience are complicit in the state-sanctioned abuse we are about to witness.

In the center of the space is a giant cube where Katurian begins the play, bound and blindfolded, at your standard metal interrogation table. But the interesting thing is that the space, while marked with intimidating metal bars, is completely empty; there is no barrier. This strange, evocative and completely non-naturalistic setup (which is courtesy, by the way, of Scenic Designer Paige Hathaway) creates a sense that the whole thing is a circus, a kangaroo court meant more as entertainment for the masses than as a legitimate investigative proceeding. At various points throughout the show, the actors even break the fourth wall, transforming the audience into silent co-conspirators. Hathaway should also be commended for the stunningly macabre mural that appears at one point in the show. The piece is a powerful work of visual art in and of itself that transforms the atmosphere of the show during a critical moment.

The stage picture is completed with a complex and dramatic lighting design by Jason Arnold and a strong costume design by Robert Croghan. The sound design, by Justin Schmitz, is an impressively active part of the show that adds sonic texture to an already imposing space.​Buried underneath all the bloody puzzle pieces that make up this play are surprising nuggets of hope: random kindnesses and the like. McDonagh never lets things get too affectionate – this is a play that gets very dark, after all. But it is a reminder that we don’t have to settle for either comedy or tragedy, social commentary or slapstick farce. We can have our cake and eat it too. And in Forum’s production, this bloody treat has never tasted better.

In Georgie: My Adventures with George Rose, Ed Dixon brings to life his relationship with friend and mentor Tony-award winning character actor George Rose. In so doing he also offers a kind of double biography of life in the theatre: Rose’s and his own. While Rose’s illustrious career is well documented, there remains even today, 18 years later, uncertainty and mystery surrounding his violent death in 1988. Dixon does not shy away from the realities of life or death in his own script for Georgie.

Georgie is part biography, part memoir, part eulogy, and part confession. It is, however, every part Theatre; Theatre about Theatre, as it happens. When discussing Rose’s pivotal role in the very first production of “The Mystery of Edwin Drood,” we even move into the recursive realm of Theatre about Theatre about Theatre. In capturing the life of someone like Rose with a tendency to “break through the fourth wall,” these layers of meaning are a deeply pleasing texture.

Last night’s performance was briefly interrupted by a power-out. The lights returned just as the young Dixon arrived at the eccentric Rose’s 1970s Greenwich apartment which, incidentally, he shared with two mountain lions. There was a lovely touch of fortuitous theatre magic about the moment, and Dixon handled this unavoidable collapse of his own fourth wall with a grace and good humour of which Rose would have approved.

Eric Schaeffer’s set design captures both the theatre and its metaphorical collapse. We are, perhaps, backstage in an abandoned theatre which has, literally, been torn from the, proverbial, pages of history. The fly system’s ropes, frayed at the edges, are torn diagonally along a line meeting a semi-destroyed proscenium. There is a careful attention to detail and meaning here, just as in the script, which lifts the piece above amusing anecdote, though there are certainly plenty of amusing anecdotes, too.

Dixon’s performance is superb, and, together with Schaeffer, who also directed the piece, they admirably handle a word-heavy 90 minutes of theatre, with few moments of repose. At the very opening, Chris Lee’s lights animate the set elegantly, though some of the repeated sharp cues delineating change of time or location became distracting and seemed unnecessarily didactic. A recording of an orchestra “tuning up” at the start of the piece is a smart and amusing theatrical touch from Justin Schmitz’s sound design.

In the script to Georgie, we return to events and phrases, each time seeing them in a new light or understanding them in a new way. Dixon brings us back to the life of George Rose, to his own life, and their relationship, for the same reason. His first impression of Rose was of a “very ordinary looking middle-aged man.” The subsequent story teaches us to be wary of first impressions, and to perhaps pay more attention to the “startling glint” in someone’s “eyes” rather than their bad choice of shoes. Georgie might not completely clarify the mystery of George Rose’s untimely demise, but it is an important, personal and affecting contribution to considering all the ambiguities of his life. There is no doubt that Dixon was gifted a story to tell in his relationship with Rose, and in its telling, Georgie demonstrates how worthy he is of this gift.

"Stars of David: Story to Song" at Theater JWritten by: John StoltenbergDecember 23, 2015

Stars of David: Story to Song--a rapturously beautiful concert musical now in a limited engagement at Theater J—is a unique blend of thrilling singing and insightful biography. Illuminating incidents from the lives of actual people—all boldface names and Jewish by birth—have been crystalized and lyricized into 14 songs sung simply and shimmeringly by a cast of four accompanied solely by a grand piano. Last night the show turned the Aaron & Cecile Goldman Theater into one of DC’s premiere concert halls. Stars of David: Story to Song is adapted from a book of the same name, a compilation of probing personal interviews conducted by journalist Abigail Pogrebin with an eclectic list of notables. Those whose lives are touched on in song in the show include many who are linked to the performing arts—Mike Nichols, Andy Cohen, Tony Kushner, Gwyneth Paltrow, Aaron Sorkin, Leonard Nimoy, Fran Drescher, Michael Feinstein, Norman Lear—and some public figures who are not—Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Gloria Steinem, Kenneth Cole, Edgar Bronfman Sr.

Theater J Associate Artistic Director Shirley Serotsky directs an ensemble of singer-actors who are so good they kept stealing and nearly stopping the show: Joshua Dick, Emily Levey, Sherri L. Edelen, and Aaron Serotsky (Shirley’s twin brother). The virtuoso pianist was Jacob Kidder; the gifted music director, George Fulginit-Shakar.And a shoutout to Sound Designer Justin Schmitz for the ace mic’ing and mixing.

Though on paper Stars of David sounds as if it could be a grab bag of tunes by dissimilar songwriters with disparate styles who just happen to have been given the same assignment, in performance the show plays completely of a piece—and more movingly than I could have imagined. “Concert musical” does not convey the show’s reach and resonance, because what connects each song sung and story told is not these notables’ fame but their very personal and private reflection on what it means to be a Jew in America. It is a question the show poses like a many-faceted crystal, glinting in all directions depending on the light. It is a question the show poses like a stone, as impenetrable as it is enduring.

The timing of Theater J’s programming of this show could not be more apt. While mainstream culture is awash in a secularized sectarian celebration that prompts no particular critical self-examination about what it means to be Christian in America, Stars of David shines a bright light on the meaning of Jewish identity that to this particular non-Jew felt awesomely universal. True, Stars of David is descriptively a concert musical. But it is far more than meets the ear. It is meaning that meets the heart.

Darius & Twig, tackles issues confronted by inner city kids throughout the country. And it does so with a mixture of hope and hard truth that is as delicate as it is engaging. You and your teenager might not leave the theatre ready to soar like Darius’s imaginary peregrine falcon “Fury”, but you’ll definitely feel the wind lift underneath your wings.

Set in New York’s Harlem, Darius & Twig is based on a novel by award-winning author Walter Dean Myers; it has been adopted for the stage by Caleen Sinnette Jennings.Its two young African American men grow up on Harlem’s violence-torn streets, but they could be growing up on any urban street in the country. Terrorized by thugs and taunted by guns, Darius and Twig have their heads filled with dreams and no amount of bad circumstances will beat them down. Twig’s heart pumps with desire: a desire to run faster than any other high schooler in the state. On the other hand, his friend Darius prefers pen to feet; in fact, when challenged to run a mile he collapses three quarters through in cries of “Uncle!” Yet, Darius’s desire to publish his story drives him again and again back to the keyboard to write and re-write. With distressed family support networks, Darius and Twig depend on each other to survive Harlem’s dangerous streets and their own internal despair.

Director Eleanor Holdridge handles the fast-paced script with excellent timing and visual diversity, moving characters in and off the stage without pause. The production team is lead by set designer Andrew Cohen whose visually dazzling set invokes a paradoxical array of oppressiveness and hope, from its somewhat crowded floor space to its wide open urban sky in the background. A big basketball backboard, pole, and hoop turns out to be more iconic than practical, however, as neither teen cares much for hoops. Lit by Johnathan Alexander and costumed by Danielle Preston, the production’s scenography adds visual depth to the play’s text.

Part of the thrill of reading Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is envisioning that night when the monster is created, the eccentric doctor shouting, the electrical wires surging through the lifeless creature and then, finally, the slight stirring of a hand as the being wakes up.In addition to relying on voice and sound, Hartmann is employing the use of Foley art (designed by CTC sound design fellow Justin Schmitz) throughout the production — including creaking doors, footsteps, electrical storms and even a body being torn apart.

Taking a note from Orson Welles’ “War of the Worlds” and his other Mercury Theatre radio plays, Hartmann has a flare for the artistic dark side. Using parts of the current Clybourne Park set, Hartmann plans to make sure that Bratton is readied for its late-night horror event. More than that, the show will be recorded live — including the reactions from the audience (Welles’ style) — and will be re-aired on the Jamestown, N.Y., station WRFA-LP (107.9 FM) and put online after the production.

“There is something, I don’t know why, that is so interesting to watch people tell a story this way,” said Andrew Borba, the CTC associate director who is playing the roles of Alphonse Frankenstein and the old man. “It’s almost pulling back the veil to watch us create an entire world when we’re just standing there.”

Hartmann made sure, however, to keep a lot of Shelley’s gothic, romantic imagery — making certain edits to make the language more audibly friendly and action-oriented — yet just as eerie.

“I want to capture that feeling of the thriller and late-night mystery,” Hartmann said. “I love putting audiences on the edge of their seat in that way. When humans are frightened, our senses are heightened. I like the idea, particularly with this radio play, that when we get the audience on the edge of their seats, they’ll be a bit more attuned to all of their senses.”

"Dark Radio" Revitalizes Foley Art on CTC StageBy Josh Austin

Various props such as a straw hat, an old pair of eye glasses and hinges act as sound effects for the play Dark Radio in the Bratton Theater.

Justin Schmitz knows peeling off the skin of an orange sounds eerily like tearing away human flesh. Though that may seem gross, it’s just part of the job for a sound designer. Schmitz, the sound design fellow at the Chautauqua Theater Company, has the creative task of using live Foley art in CTC’s New Play Workshop piece, Dark Radio, which has a workshop performance at 4 p.m. today at Bratton Theater. And though an orange simulating harsh torture isn’t part of this play, Schmitz has some other interesting tricks up his sleeve.

Foley art is the use of live props or machines to create everyday sounds, generally enhanced by microphones; a Foley artist is the person who creates the sounds. The art got its start in 1927 at Universal Studios, where artist Jack Donovan Foley was working at the time. While on the sound team for the silent film “Show Boat,” Foley found that sound effects and other ambient noises had to be added to the movie after it was shot.

“[Foley art] is a lot of just finding objects in the prop show and going, ‘What does this do?’ ” Schmitz said. “Then it’s figuring out, ‘What does this do if I add a microphone?’ It’s a matter of being able to be very creative with materials around you and making it sound as if it were real life.”

The art form, still heavily employed in motion pictures, television programs and video games, also became a staple of old-time radio shows. In the 1930s, when radio truly exploded into mainstream American culture, the radio waves were cluttered with sci-fi, mysteries, Western and romance programs, each with their own sound effects. The effects aimed to instill images of the show in the listener’s mind, like a creaky door in a mystery program.

Orson Welles’ War of the Worlds, an iconic radio drama and a big influence of Colin McKenna’s Dark Radio, provides a nostalgic look back at how Foley helped create rather intense drama. The show was aired the night before Halloween in 1939 and caused such a panic that people believed the world was actually coming to an end.

Taking a note from Welles, McKenna’s dark play mixes a hostile sci-fi with a gritty horror genre. His piece echoes old-time radio shows, with the actors portraying the on-air characters while also creating real-life sounds.

“I think this show is going to scare people,” said Jacob Dresch, a conservatory actor who plays 12-year-old Tex in the show. “I feel like Foley is just another extension of that classic radio-centric archetype of War of the Worlds. It’s the perfect extension of what the play’s all about. If you know those old radio shows, this will reverberate in a very interesting way to that vocabulary.”

For Schmitz, Foley art is also about learning the tricks of the trade — like the gruesome orange ruse. The designer taught himself about Foley and about which objects can make which noise; he’s come up with a table of useful noisemakers to aid the show.

“It makes it immediate, visceral,” Dresch said. “You can hear it; it’s in the air waves. … It really is something physical happening.”

To create the sound of a whip crack for horses, Schmitz devised a slapstick, or, simply, two pieces of wood slapping together. To make the sounds of horses traversing across gravel, the designer uses coconut shells. He also needed to create the sound of wind. Instead of having an actor use his or her breath, Schmitz came across a piece of tubing to achieve that noise.

“The Foley will help to establish a style to the piece and overall experience that the audience is meant to be having,” said Arielle Goldman, a conservatory actor who is playing Paige in the show. “But, they’re not just watching something in a proscenium theater — it’s all around you. It also just feeds your imagination, which always needs feeding.”

Goldman, Dresch and Schmitz all said that Foley art is making a comeback in professional theater; new playwrights are using the artistic form to add an additional layer to their shows. Schmitz said that adding the vintage element to a new play really forces the cast and crew to take ownership of achieving the artistic intention of the show, all the while having fun figuring out how to do so.

“It’s allowing your inner child and the world of discovery to be completely open 24/7,” Schmitz said.

UW-L Senior Has an Ear for Sound DesignBy: Terry Rindfleisch

You don't see the work of Justin Schmitz on a theater stage. You hear it. Schmitz, a 22-year-old UW-L senior from Sparta who has designed sound for many shows, is considered one of the top student sound designers in the United States. His latest work is on display in the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse production of "Dracula," which runs through Sunday. He was one of eight national finalists in the sound design contest in the Kennedy Center/ American College Theatre Festival in Washington, D.C. And last month Schmitz had a chance to work with Broadway sound designers at the festival. "It was one of the greatest learning experiences," he said.

Schmitz was judged for his work in UW-L's 2010 production of "Eurydice." He also composed music for the show. While Schmitz did not win the sound design competition, he was offered a fellowship with the Orchard Project in Hunter, N.Y., which performs workshops on new shows getting ready for staging. When he graduates May 14, Schmitz plans to pursue a career in sound design and teach it some day.

"Justin has really grown as a sound designer, and he has learned when to use sound and when not use sound," said Ron Stoffregen, technical director and sound designer for UW-L theater. "He's not afraid to try new things and not afraid to dream big - and he has the tenacity to go after it," he said.

"Dracula" is his biggest challenge, with 700 sound cues and coordinating bat and howling wolf sounds with music, fog and magic tricks, Schmitz said."It has to be a larger-than-life sound in ‘Dracula,'" he said. "There's ton of effects, and we want it as spooky, haunting and frightening as possible."Schmitz, a 2006 Sparta High School graduate, said he spends 300 to 400 hours per show on sound design, but "Dracula" required more than 1,000 hours. "Sound design is a creative aspect of theater the audience doesn't think about unless it's bad," Schmitz said. "It should not detract but only enhance the story. "It allows me to ‘perform' on stage because the sound is connected with the action on stage," he said.

Schmitz also has directed three UW-L student productions and acted in four including "Hair" and "Cabaret."

But his heart - and ears - are in sound design. "When you read a script, you have to be able to hear it," he said. "I love the storytelling aspect of sound design."

UW-L theatre sound design student wins spot at national competition Jan. 11, 2011Justin Schmitz, a senior majoring in theatre, has advanced to the national finals of the Kennedy Center/American College Theatre Festival (KC/ACTF) in Washington, D.C. Schmitz’s sound design for the department’s 2010 production of “Eurydice,” by Sarah Ruhl, was selected from 22 sound designs from Region III to be advanced to the national competition.

Schmitz will travel to Washington, D.C., in April to compete at the national level.

The department was well represented at the regional festival, held Jan. 5-9 in Lansing, Mich. The October 2010 production of “The Last Days of Judas Iscariot” was one of eight productions chosen to perform from more than 50 college entries in the four-state region.

“Our students are so dedicated and talented,” said UW-L’s Associate Professor of Theatre Mary Leonard. “They always rise to the occasion.”

UW-L students achieved individual success as well. Lindsay Van Norman, a senior majoring in theatre, advanced to the second round in the Irene Ryan Acting competition. Erica Perrin, stage manager for “The Last Days of Judas Iscariot,” advanced to the final round in the stage management division. Claire Ganshert, Tim McCarren and Amy Nelson received a certificate of merit for ensemble acting for their roles in “Eurydice.”

Faculty members receiving certificates of merit include Joe Anderson for costume design for “The Last Days of Judas Iscariot” and Gary Walth, music director for “Into the Woods.”

“We’re incredibly proud of our students and were thrilled to represent UW-La Crosse at this prestigious competition,” said Anderson, chair of the Theatre Arts Department. “The production was very well received and gained the attention of everyone there. Our reputation in the region was raised exponentially. We greatly appreciate the support from the community, the College of Liberal Studies, and the university, all of which helped us to achieve this success.”

Every year on his birthday, Krapp sits at his desk, with cardboard boxes of reel-to-reel tapes behind him, and records himself talking about his life and experiences from the previous year. On his 69th birthday, he listens to the recording he made as a 39-year-old and then records his impressions as a 69-year-old. He hears how different his thoughts and life are now that he’s an old man.

That’s the setting for Samuel Beckett’s play “Krapp’s Last Tape,” which will be staged by University of Wisconsin-La Crosse students Friday and Saturday in the Frederick Theatre in Morris Hall.

“Krapp’s Last Tape” is a one-act, one-man play about a man trying to find the meaning of life, said Justin Schmitz, a junior from Sparta, who is directing the play. Dylan Zalewski, a senior and veteran UW-L actor who plays Krapp, said he found the script compelling after reading it for a class. “I find it interesting that he records himself and gets mad at himself when he listens to the recording as he rewinds the tape of his life,” Zalewski said.Schmitz said the small, intimate setting of the Frederick Theatre is perfect for the play because “you feel part of the room.”

At age 69, Krapp is basically a pessimist and a brooding old man, Zalewski said. Krapp calls the world “muckball,” he said. “He fights with himself, and he’s in denial and regretful,” Zalewski said. “He has a dark, grim view of the world but, like us, he must accept the absurdities of life, or let it get the best of him and die miserable.” One of the many conflicts and themes is that Krapp focused more on business than his personal life when he was young, he said. The rhythmical script is difficult and challenging, Schmitz said. And as a director, the play allows Schmitz to delve deeply into a character.

Beckett wrote specific instructions in the script that must be followed, such as the exact moment of a sigh, Zalewski said. “I’ve never done this style of theater before,” Zalewski said, adding that he saw Beckett’s “Endgame,” staged by the Milwaukee Repertory Theatre earlier this year. Beckett also wrote “Waiting for Godot.”

“Krapp’s Last Tape” is a play of reflection and the power of solitude, too, Zalewski said. “In one sense, this play can be frustrating, but you can feel what Krapp is feeling although you may not agree with him. You may question your own life,” he said. The play ventures into the world of absurdism to discover the “intricate nuances and meanings of life,” Schmitz said. “It’s a very thoughtful play, and it will challenge your thoughts,” he said.

About Zalewski and SchmitzDylan Zalewski has appeared in many UW-L plays, including “The Diary of Anne Frank,” “Inspecting Carol,” “Arabian Nights” and “A Christmas Carol.” Justin Schmitz directed “Will You Join Me for Dinner?” last year at UW-L and has designed sound for several shows. He will be the sound designer for “A Midsummer’s Night Dream” in December.